Adventure on West Side Island
by Mutitoon90
Summary: Sonic and Mary were planning for some relaxation on West Side Island, but Doctor Robotnik, also known as Doctor Eggman, has other plans. With a new mission ahead of them and a new friend by their side, the two hedgehogs traverse the damaged island for the Chaos Emeralds and to stop the mad man's plans of taking over the world.
1. Chapter 1

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter One<p>

In the middle of a plain, a two-story, white house with a few wild flowers on the lawn. In the driveway was in the taxi, and two men were standing around it. One man was young, had brown hair and eyes, wearing a white polo shirt and blue jeans. The second was an older man, border-lining bewteen middle-age and old-age, which was seen in his half-gray, half-blonde hair, wearing a white lab coat, a begie shirt, black slacks and brown loafers.

The younger man had placed the last of the luggage into the truck before he turned to the older man and asked, "Is that all?"

The near-elderly man stopped and pondered for a moment, when a voice rang out to the blonde-gray haired man.

"Grandpa!"

Then, a young girl with messy blonde hair, which was tied in a ponytail, exited the house. The girl wore a white T-shirt, blue jeans, red shoes, and an aqua vest.

"Mary," The old man responded to the girl, "what is it that I've forgotten?"

"You've forgotten to say 'good-bye.'" The girl smiled widely.

The old man chuckled as he rubbed his hand on the child's head as he said, "Good-bye, Mary."

The teen smiled as her grandfather closed the door. Mary backed off a bit before the taxi cab drove off. The child looked on until the cab was out of sight, before she went into the house.

Once inside, Mary hopped around the house in glee; it had been two weeks since she ran away from the orphanage, which lead to her finding the cyan Chaos Emerald and meeting her dearest friend, Sonic the Hedgehog.

However, her grandfather made her promise to do her chores, which made Mary depressed for a small period of time. When she got over it, she smiled; in her mind, she would be able to see Sonic soon, it just would be a little later than she had hoped.

So, Mary cleaned the house from top to bottom, making sure that she did not leave any evidence that she had neglected her duties at the house. However, she got hungry by the time she had finished cleaning, but this gave Mary an idea about what to bring to Sonic's world.

Mary went to her bedroom and pulled out her blue-green backpack, which was packed with clothes, items needed from adventure, and her skating gear. Then, she went under her bed and pulled out an old shoebox, opened it, and remove the sole object in it: the Chaos Emerald.

"Good to see you again." The girl said to the jewel as she put the food basket next to her backpack.

Then, she put on her pack and grabbed the basket. She picked up the Emerald and ran downstairs. Once there, she locked the doors and windows and activated the security system that her grandfather designed and made himself.

With that done, Mary pulled out a piece of paper and left it on the coffee table, which said that she was on a camping trip and would return soon. This was in case that her grandfather returned home before she did. Mary knew that her grandfather trusted her enough to allow her to go camping.

"Alright." Mary announced to herself, "Next stop: South Island."

Then, a bright cyan light covered the girl, and Mary's world went black.

* * *

><p>Mary opened her eyes to find herself in the body of 'Maria' once again.<p>

_"Man,"_ Mary spoke in her mind, _"not this again!"_

This time, Mary saw men wearing what looked like a SWAT team's uniforms. The men scared Mary, who sensed 'Maria's' fear as well as a gasp was heard, which grabbed the men's attention to her. As 'Maria' started to back away the men, a familiar and gloved hand grabbed 'Maria' by the hand and started to dragged her. As 'Maria' turned to the direction that she was being pulled, Mary's mind went dark, but not before Mary saw the shape what was pulling her.

_"Sonic?"_

* * *

><p>Mary's vision returned to normal as she found herself in an unfamiliar room. Sitting up, the girl-now-hedgehog looked around.<p>

The room looked like the inside of a log cabin with a dark green chair, a purple rug, glass lamps, a medium sized TV set, two bookshelves filled with books. Mary looked at what she was sitting on, which was a blue couch that waws very comfortable.

The yellow hedgehog got to her feet and remembered that she was missing a few things, like the Chaos Emerald, her basket, and her backpack. Panicking, Mary looked at the room again.

"Hey, Mary!"

The old voice of a good friend of Mary's calmed the child's mind as she turned to see the older hedgehog sitting in a kitchen nook and near the basket, the pack, and the jewel that brought her into that world.

Sheepishly, Mary blushed and said, "Sorry about the unexpected appearance, Uncle Chuck."

A chuckle that reminded her of her grandfather's laugh caused her to remember that the blue, whiskered hedgehog was friendly and a true friend, like his nephew.

"So, where's Sonic?" Mary asked, failing to see the younger hedgehog from that world.

"Don't know." The uncle confessed, "Haven't seen him since he brought you in."

"Hmm, did Sonic make plans?"

Uncle Chuck was about to speak, but the door opened, revealing the very hedgehog that Mary and Uncle Chuck was talking about. The younger male hedgehog had a grin on his face as he looked at the female hedgehog as she exclaimed.

"Sonic!"


	2. Chapter 2

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Two<p>

Sonic and Mary were outside, talking to each other about the things that happened after the two hedgehogs went to their separate ways. Sonic told Mary about his uncle's house that he built with some help from the animals, which were the residents of South Island, that the hedgehogs rescued from being controlled by Eggman. Mary told Sonic about her grandfather, who was still alive, her alertcation with her grandmother, Amanda Lert, the charges of attempted murder that Lert had earned by hiring a hitman to kill Gregory Allenson, and the bloodly nose that Mary gave to Lert on the day of her return to her world.

"Now!" An impressed Sonic exclaimed, "That creep desevred it, Mary!"

Mary blushed a little as she replied, "At the very least!"

Then, the yellow hedgehog noticed that Sonic was walking towards a red biplane. It had striking white markings on its body, but the most surprising marking was the 'SONIC' on the side. The female hedgehog ran to the other side and found more white letters, this time it read 'TORNADO.'

"It's a cool plane, isn't it?" Mary heard Sonic's voice, causing the girl to turn to her friend.

"I don't get to see vintage airplanes very often." Mary confessed. Then, she asked, "Does it work?"

"Of course." Sonic announced with a grin, "My dad and Uncle Chuck used this in many battles against Eggman."

"Wow! That's so cool!" Mary giggled with glee, earning a brotherly smile from the blue hedgehog, who asked, "Want to ride in it?"

"Me? Ride in it?" Mary expressed a fear-filled face. Then, the hedgehog answered with great excitement said, "SURE!"

Sonic laughed; Mary was a fun girl to be around, despite the fact that she was from another world. Then, he realized that Mary's things were in the log cabin.

"Mary, you should get your stuff out of Uncle Chuck's house."

Confused, Mary inqurried, "Why?"

The blue blur simply answered with his smile on his face.

"Well, I was planning to go to West Side Island for a trip, and I was planning to go by myself, but now you're here, I was wondering that if you wanted to come."

"Going to another island?" Mary asked, stunned to hear this invite, "In this world?"

"Well, yeah!" Sonic announced, confused by Mary's behavior.

"Oh! Sorry! Guess I was a little shocked." Mary said, covering her mouth.

"Shocked about the what?" Sonic asked his friend, who said, "I've never been invited to anything, except for the debutante ball given by Grandmother Lert."

"That says a lot about the lady." Sonic said, impressed about the woman's gift, but Mary added her information.

"Without the cotillion ball, it does."

"Huh?"

Keeping her frustation under control, Mary explained to Sonic.

"The cotillion ball is for the preteens, and the debutante ball was for girls reaching for their twenty-first birthday. I was ten at the time."

A feeling of disgust hit Sonic; his earlier impression of the woman that Mary was forced to call 'Grandmother' was no longer on 'egotistical bully,' but now it was on ' greedy monster.'

"Don't worry," Mary gave a smile, "NO one went to that party."

Sonic laughed in relief as he followed Mary to the cabin. When the hedgehogs entered the log house, Uncle Chuck greeted them.

"Sonny-boy, Mary, getting ready to go to West Side Island?"

The hedgehogs comfired his answered.

"Sure."

"Good to hear." The older hedgehog said with a big, fatherly grin.

Mary went to the kitchen nook and grabbed her things, when she heard a loud, buzzing noise.

"WHAT IS THAT!" Mary yelled out over the noise to the male hedgehogs.

The blue hedgehogs did not answer, but they ran off to another room. Peeved that she was being left behind, Mary went after the males. The yellow hedgehog followed Sonic and Uncle Chuck to a different room and a large machine with a map of many islands and continents on it. The map had a single part of itself glowing.

"What is it?" Mary asked the hedgehog.

Uncle Chuck turned to Mary and answered, "Oh, the C.E.D. picked up an energy signal."

"The C.E.D.? What's that?"

Sonic turned to Mary and answered the girl's questions.

"The Chaos Energy Detector is a machine, which its function is pretty self-explainatory."

"Oh, I get it!" Mary announced her realization, "It detects clusters of Chaos energy, like the Chaos Emeralds, and it announces the location of the clusters."

"That's right," Uncle Chuck answered, "and that's where we have problems."

"What do you mean?" Mary asked, but Sonic answered, "The Chaos Emeralds are on West Side Island."

* * *

><p>The two younger hedgehogs were outside and had possession of the cyan Chaos Emerald, which Uncle Chuck had borrowed to use on the C.E.D. to find to the Chaos Emeralds.<p>

"Sonic, where am I suppose to sit?" Mary asked, looking at the only seat that she could see on the biplane.

The blue hedgehog pushed the top of the body of the plane and revealed the hidden seat to Mary, answering the yellow hedgehog's question.

"Sorry 'bout that." A now-meek Mary said with a sheepishly grin as her friend put her backpack and basket under the revealed seat.

Chuckling, Sonic said, "That's okay. As I recall, you didn't see the _Tornado_ the last time you were here."

"Right." Mary scrathched her head, causing a quill, which looked like a large lock of hair, to fall to the side of her face.

Putting all silliness aside, the blue hedgehog said, "Don't worry about it. We gotta go."

Mary smiled back at Sonic before she hopped into the back seat of the airplane, as Uncle Chuck ran out of the house, shouting at the younger hedgehogs.

"Good luck!"

Sonic started the engine, the propeller spun around, and soon, the _Tornado_ flew off into the sky. Wacthing the take-off, Uncle Chuck waved good-bye to the departing friends.

"Hope those two find the Emerald before Robotnik, or someone like him, does."


	3. Chapter 3

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>After two hours of flight, Sonic turned to Mary, who had fallen asleep during the flight. The blue hedgehog shook his head.<p>

"I wasn't expecting that."

As the _Tornado_ started to descend to the isle, someone on the island saw the in-coming plane. A pair of sky blue eyes glared at the aircraft, telling that the eyes' owner was ready to fight.

Once the plane landed, Sonic shut off the engine and turned to the sleeping Mary. Sonic was about to wake her, but he pulled back. He thought that he would go ahead and get the landscape layout by taking a look, before he could return and wake up his friend. With that in his mind, he turned around in his seat, pulled out the Chaos Emerald that he hidden for the flight, and put it in Mary's lap.

"There!" Sonic said softly, "Now, you'll be ready to fight off any Badniks."

The girl stirred a little, but she reminded asleep. Sonic smiled before he hopped off the biplane and dashed off to a nearby waterfall.

As soon as Sonic was out of sight, the cyan jewel glowed brightly. The light reached Mary's eyes and woke her up.

"Hmm? What?"

The yellow hedgehog opened her eyes and found herself all alone on a white, sandy beach. Looking around, Mary wondered where Sonic was, but she did find the Chaos Emerald on her lap.

Picking up the gem, Mary said, "What a thoughtful guy that Sonic! Now, where is that hedgehog?"

Wanting to search for her friend, Mary decided to ready herself for anything that might cause her to fight against Badniks. Pulling out her backpack and putting it on, Mary hopped out of the airplane and followed the imprints that Sonic left in the sands, which led to the hills. As she searched for the blue hedgehog, Mary had a strange feeling that she was being followed by someone, but she chose to ignore it and went on.

"Well, a lost hedgehog." A familiar voice rang out, causing great fear and concern in Mary.

The yellow hedgehog turned around, but she found no one. Then, she looked up and saw Doctor Ivo Robotnik, better known as Eggman.

Blue eyes became hard as Mary shouted at the old scienist floating in a hovercraft, which was bladed, "Eggman! What are you doing here?"

The old man grinned darkly as he gave his answer to the young female hedgehog.

"Why, I'm in search for the Chaos Emeralds, and I believe the best place to do that is in the Emerald Hills."

"Just who do you think you are?" Mary glared at the doctor harshly, as the cyan stone was held tighter to the girl's chest, "I know you're not gonna take my Emerald from me."

"Well," Eggman announced, "we'll just see about that."

Then, the old man flew off into some palm trees. Seeing this made Mary very uncomfortable, and so did the sound of a very large engine trying to start.

"I think I should run for it," Mary spoke to no one as she backed away from the noise, "like NOW!"

* * *

><p>After a investigation, Sonic stood on top of a tall hill as he saw the damage that was placed onto the island.<p>

"This isn't good."

Then, he heard a sound, like slower version of helicopter blades whirling. He turned around and saw a yellow-orange fox.

The fox was wearing white gloves, white socks, and red and white shoes, but the most interesting detail about the fox was his two tails.

"A two-tailed fox? Cool!"

"Safe it!" The young fox yelled at Sonic, who stepped back a little before he countered the fox's shout.

"Hey, what did I do to you to deserve that?"

The two-tailed fox was shocked as he stepped from the blue hedgehog. He had realized his mistake, but a loud voice stopped him from apologizing.

"SONIC!"

The blue hedgehog turned to the direction of the cry and recongized it.

"Mary!" Sonic turned to the yellow-orange fox and said, "Sorry, kid, but I'm needed right now!"

Then, Sonic dashed off, like the wind, and leaving the fox behind. The young fox glared at the hedgehog and spoke out.

"Not without me!"

* * *

><p>Mary's mind was filled with fear as she turned around and ran for her life as a huge vehicle with a drill in the front. The girl looked behind her, which truly discouraged her, but she looked away and tried to run even faster, but it was in vain, because she had reached a huge cliff, which were a few stories tall.<p>

"Man! Do I need divine intervention now!" Mary announced as the Egg Drill came closer to her.

Then, Sonic sped to the cliff and shouted, "Eggman!"

The scienist turned his attention to the blue hedgehog. Upon seeing Sonic, Eggman grinned evilly as he turned to the drill to the hedgehog and slammed a finger on a button.

Keeping his cool, Sonic stood his ground as the drill was firing up to fly at him. The drill flew from the car, like a bullet from a gun. Sonic saw the huge projectile and grinned before he jumped into the air, curled into a ball, and spun into Eggman's vehicle. The powerful blow to the car caused it to be pushed off the cliff.

Eggman's Eggmobile flew from the falling vehicle and said, "I'll get you hedgehogs yet!"

Then, a ball of yellow spikes hit the Eggmobile and sent it flying with the doctor in it. The sphere turned into Mary Allenson, who was proud of sending the scienist away, but she had another problem: she was too far from the cliff to land on the cliff.

Mary started to fall, but a gloved hand grabbed the falling hedgehog, keeping her airborne. She looked up and saw a yellow-orange fox with white gloves, red and white shoes hovering over her as he took her back to the cliff.

"Thanks for the rescue." Mary said to the two-tailed rescuer, who blushed and said, "Not a problem."

Sonic smiled as he called out to Mary and the younger fox.

"Guys, come over here!"

Mary looked at Sonic, who was waving at them. The yellow hedgehog turned to the fox and said, "Let's go."

"Okay!" The fox responded with a nod.

The two new friends went to the blue hedgehog. Once there, Sonic smiled and asked the fox, "What's your name, kid?"

The fox chuckled as he answered.

"My name's Miles Prower."

The introduction of the two-tailed fox surprised Sonic greatly, causing Mary to be concerned.

"Sonic, what's wrong?"

"It's nothing, Mary, it's just I didn't recongizned what clan Miles is from." The blue hedgehog smiled out of embarrassment.

"The clan?" Mary asked. Sonic responded quickly.

"Yeah, the Prower clan's famous for the fact that most of them have two tails. Then again, to have a member of any family that can fly is rare!"

"Not to mention," Miles interjected between Sonic and Mary, "Our families know each other."

"Right," Sonic confirmed, "but I didn't know that Amadeus or Merlin had a son."

"Why's that?" Mary asked, looking at both Sonic and Miles.

The fox answered.

"Dad and Uncle Merlin felt gulity about Julius's death."

"So they hid away from the world as long as they could, knowing that Uncle Chuck and Sonic were around." Mary guessed, and Sonic confirmed it by saying, "That's right."

Then, the sound of a growling stomach was heard the three of them. The boys looked at Mary, who blushed and said, "Guess I'm a little hungry."


	4. Chapter 4

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Four<p>

After Sonic went to the _Tornado_ to get Mary's basket, returned to Mary and Miles, and they ate, the trio went off to one of the areas that Eggman had made a scar to the island's beauty.

"There's the Chemical plant." Miles announced as he pointed at the area.

Mary was shocked upon seeing the industrial cityscape. It was filled with mechanical creatures and toxic slime and chemicals. The one thing that made Mary feel a great mixture of fear and disgust was the robots that looked like the oringinal residents.

"This is just too horrible!" The female hedgehog announced as she turned to Sonic.

"Don't worry, Mary." The blue hedgehog said, trying to calm Mary, "We'll set things right."

The yellow hedgehog was still very shakened by the sight of the Chemical plant, but Mary regained her courage.

"You're right, Sonic! Let's go!"

The blue blur nodded and turned to the fox and asked, "Ready to go, Tails?"

Bewildered, Miles have to ask a question.

"Why did you call me 'Tails?'"

The female hedgehog had the same question and said, "Yeah, Sonic?"

"Well," Sonic answered his friends' questions, "'Tails' sounds much better than 'Miles,' right?"

"Well, you do have a point." Mary answered thoughtfully.

"Well, I like it!" A very excited fox announced, giving a smile from the hedgehogs.

"That's good to hear." Sonic said, and Mary added, "Today, Eggman faces the three of us."

As the boys agreed, the trio went off to the Chemical plant to find the Egg Capusle to free the creatures from Eggman's control.

The three went through the metal terrain. Sonic and Mary was sucked into many suction tubes that often spat them out at the other end, and sometimes the hedgehogs ran down steep drops, which led to cliffs. Sonic managed to make the jumps, but Mary needed help from Tails, who came to the rescue.

At times, Mary and Sonic were being attacked by spider-like robots, called Grabbers. At one time, Mary was caught by one of them, but Sonic rescued her. Then, a bunch of mechanical 'mouths,' called Spinys,' that shot bolts at the group. Sonic managed to destory the robots and freeing the animals in the machine, while Mary flew over them with help from Tails.

Purple and yellow blocks came at the group, trying to push them into the purple-pink chemical waters. Sonic jumped over the block, but Mary needed the help to evade the squares, but Sonic was the helper.

Then, the trio managed to dodge the jets of blue chemicals. Sonic's speed helped him greatly, while Mary and Tails just went around them.

"Man!" Mary exclaimed as the three stopped to rest for a bit, "Eggman's going all-out on trying to stop us."

"You can say that again, Mary." Sonic agreed with his friend.

"Hey," Tails asked, "where are we?"

Hearing this question, Sonic and Mary took a good look around the area where they were at. They were standing on a platform that looked weak, but it managed to hold the trio. Under the platform was a purple-pink liquid water, causing Mary, Tails, and Sonic to be very concerned about their safety.

"The pink stuff's bad news; how bad is the question." The yellow hedgehog announced, which was agreed by her allies.

Then, a rumble was felt by the trio, whom almost fell onto their backsides. The three was trying not to fall off the platform, as a submarine rose from the pick liquid. Mary saw this and instantly got a bad feeling about the submarine.

"Things just got bad for us." The she-hedgehog announced to her friends.

Sonic asked his friends, "Do you think it's Eggman?"

Then, the submarine opened and revealed the driver, Eggman.

"That was dumb question." Mary announced to the blue hedgehog, who said, "It was an honest question."

"Ha, ha, ha! So nice of the three of you to come here!" Eggman said in a very unsincere tone of voice.

"What do you what, Eggman?" Mary and Sonic asked the scienist, who grinned darkly at the hedgehogs and their friend.

"My, my, quite curious about your fates."

The friends backed from the mad man, who continued to speak.

"Look at this chemical that surrounds the area. That liquid is something I've created for this occasion. It's something I like to call Megamalatricarbosonichloride."

"A poison!" Mary exclaimed loudly, grabbing the males' attention.

"Ha!" Eggman laughed at the female before he congraulated the girl, "Very good, you've been doing your homework, but it's should not concern you a bit."

"Not when it concerns my life, but when my friend has his name in the poion, then it does." The yellow hedgehog announced to the doctor.

"Ha," Eggman grinned again before saying, "I'm very impressed, but I'm willing to make a deal with the three of you: if you give me the Chaos Emeralds you have, I will promise to spare all of your lives."

The offer shook Mary and Tails, but Sonic just glared at the scientist. Mary turned to Sonic and said, "Sonic, it's really up to you."

Then, Tails said to Sonic, "Yeah, we'll follow you anyway we choose."

Sonic turned his face to the floor and said, "I'm sorry."

Tails and Mary at Sonic, then to each other, and returned their attention to the blue hedgehog, who spoke to them.

"Mary, Tails, sorry to do ask you guys, but will you two stay my side in the fight?"

The two friends of Sonic the hedgehog smiled widely before they turned to Eggman, who was very displeased with the trio's decision.

"So, you three chose to die!"

Picking himself up, Sonic looked at Eggman and replied.

"No, we chose to fight you."

"And we refuse to allow you to take over the world." Mary spoke out.

"You'll pay for what you've done to West Side Island!" Tails shouted at the doctor.

Eggman growled and deattached the Eggmoible from the top of the submarine. Seeing this, the trio readied themselves for battle as they saw a canister of the poisonious liquid.

"Prepared to die?" Eggman asked, obviously ready to attack the trio.

"No," Sonic answered, "we're ready to fight!"

With that said, a platform flipped, almost sending Sonic to an possible early grave, but Tails came to the rescue, much to Eggman's disappointment.

Mary was quick to charge at the flying machine, only to end up being slung to the fuschia liquid.

"Well, it's not Sonic," the mad man grinned darkly, "but he'll be joining her soon enough!"

Then, Sonic was seen by the doctor, who flew to them and got above Tails and Sonic and pressed a button. Then, a claw extended out the canister, and the contents was dropped onto them, but Tails flew out of the way and flew into a position to send Sonic to Eggman's machine and threw him.

"What!" It was the only thing that Eggman managed to say before he was sent flying in a spiral.

With victory in hand and Tails holding by the other hand, Sonic was carried to the other side of the turning platforms, he went to the Egg Capusle and freed the animals.

"Yeah!" Tails gleefully cheered, but Sonic returned to the pool of poison, more concerned about Mary's safety than his own.

"Mary!" The blue hedgehog yelled out to the pinkish-purple slime.

Then, Mary appeared as a plaform flipped. The slime-covered hedgehog ran to the over side of the platforms as quickly as she could. As she ran, Sonic noticed that Sonic had something in Mary's hand.

Barely controlling himself, Sonic turned around and called out of Tails, who came to the hedgehogs.

"Mary!" The fox exclaimed happily upon seeing the yellow female, "We thought you were a goner!"

"Tails!" Sonic turned to the young fox, "Take Mary to a nearby water source; she needs to take this gunk off of her."

"This Mega Mack?" Mary guessed, before adding, "Well, he's got a point."

"Mega Mack?" The males asked the female.

"The poison smile that Eggman tried to get you in for a swim."

"Ha," Sonic thought out, "Mega Mack's not a bad name."

"Tails," Mary turned to the fox, "We better go ahead of Sonic."

"Right." Tails nodded to the yellow hedgehog, and Mary started off, with the yellow fox following close behind.

Once his friends out of sight, Sonic glared at the slime, wondering how accurate Mary was about Eggman's detemination.


	5. Chapter 5

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Five<p>

Near a set of ruins, a green-blue backpack sat by itself, when a light peach hand grabbed it and pulled it to it owner. Tails was sitting by himself, waiting for Mary to be done with cleaning herself, her clothes and the Chaos Emerald that the yellow hedgehog had found at the bottom of the slime, now known as Mega Mack.

"Mary," the yellow fox whined out at the hedgehog he could not see, "when are you gonna be done?"

"I've told you before: I'll be done as soon as I could. I'm sorry for taking so long, but I did warn you about the length of time."

The fox sighed deeply, not wanting to wait much longer. He was about to get up and leave, when he heard the two words he had been waiting for Mary to say.

"I'm done!"

Hopping to his feet, Tails saw the attire Mary chose to wear: a blue shirt, black pants, black socks, and a green light jacket. The only thing that the girl kept were the shoes.

"Uh, Mary, are you sure that Sonic's going to be alright with those shoes?" Tails pointed out to the she-hedgehog.

"Don't worry," Mary said, "I almost destoryed the shoes by scrubbing them."

"Okay." An unsure Tails said, hoping that Mary was right.

"Now with that out of the way," the yellow hedgehog said with a smile on her face, "Let's clean up, and then we'll go look for Sonic!"

"Well, it's gonna be easier for you guys then."

The two friends looked at the direction of the voice and saw Sonic.

"Sonic, it's good to see you." Tails said, evidently bored out of his young mind.

"Sorry if it took us a little long, Sonic." Mary announced, "It really took me a while to scrub the Mega Mack from my shoes."

"It's okay." The blue hedgehog spoke out, "You were trying to keep me out of trouble."

Mary smiled for a moment before Tails shouted at the friends.

"Hey, let's go before Eggman takes over the whole island!"

"My," Mary said as she rubbed her ears, "that's a pair of lungs Tails has."

"Boy, you can say that again." Sonic agreed as his ears throbbed in pain.

Soon, the trio went off into the ruins.

* * *

><p>As the three looked around, Mary noticed that the crumbling stonework ruins was half-submerged with water, and that reminded her of one thing about Sonic: he cannot swim!<p>

"Aw, man!" Sonic yelled out, "What are we going to do?"

"Sonic," Mary turned to her blue friend, "remember the Labyrith ruins?"

"Yeah." Sonic answered, allowing Mary to speak more.

"Well, we'll do the same thing we did than."

"Aw, man!" Sonic exclaimed again.

"Don't worry, Sonic," Tails announced, "with my tails acting as a propellor, we'll be able to get through the water faster."

Mary smiled and said, "Tails, that's a great idea!"

The blue hedgehog could not help himself from smiling as he had to agree with Mary about Tails's idea.

The group hopped into the water, and Tails and Mary swam and Sonic held on to them. Then, Tails turned around and saw a blue-grey fish-like robot. Frightened by the sight of the shrap-toothed robot, Tails spun his tails so fast that he almost lost his grip on Mary and Sonic, whom were shocked at the sudden change of speed. The yellow-orange fox kept the pace until the trio reached dry land.

"What was that about, Tails?" Mary asked the tired fox, who panted out his answer.

"I...saw a...Chop-Chop!"

"A Chop-Chop?" Mary asked, "What's that?"

Then, the robot that chased after the group jumped off of the water, snapped its teeth twice in a manner as if introducing itself and returned to the water.

Mary, seeing this, took back her question, saying, "Never mind."

This was not the last time Tails rushed the group out of trouble in the water, as well as the last robot encounter in the ruins.

By the time it was an hour before sunset, the trio managed to defeat swarms of fly-like robots called Whisps, evaded arrows shot at them by an ancient traps in pillars, many Chop-Chops when the group was underwater, episodes of almost drowning that was prevented by finding large air bubbles, and drill-like robots called Grounders attacking them under and above the water.

"Oh, boy!" Mary was looking at the setting sun, "If we don't find the Egg Capusle soon, we'll be sending the night here."

The blue hedgehog looked at the red sun and agreed with Mary.

"Yeah, and I don't want to stand guard at night."

Turning to her friend, the yellow hedgehog said, "Not if we find the Egg Capusle and find a more secure place to rest for the night."

As Mary and Sonic talked, more or less, Tails, who had just dried off his two tails, flew to the top of an ancient stone pillar. The young fox was trying to help his friends by looking for the Egg Capusle, but he failed to see a giant hammer that was about to smash him.

"Tails!" Mary's voice grabbed the fox's attention, but Sonic grabbed the two-tailed fox before the hammer hit where Tails stood at.

Sonic released the fox, who was embraced by a very concerned Mary.

"Thank goodness! You're okay!"

"I'm okay!" Tails yelled as he tried to escape the embrace, "But can you let me go?"

"Sorry!" Mary released the two-tailed child, who felt very fortunate to be able to breath again.

"Well, well," Eggman's voice rang out to the group, "looking out for each other's backs, how noble."

Just as the trio looked up at the man driving the Eggmobile, an arrow flew at them. Sonic was the only one who saw the arrow coming. Quickly, the hedgehog grabbed his friends and dodged the arrow.

"What was that for?" Tails asked Sonic, who answered, "The arrow that was coming at you and Mary."

Mary looked at the projectile and saw the arrow sticking out in another totem. This gave Mary an idea of how to beat Eggman.

"Man!" Sonic exclaimed, "We can't fight Eggman in the air with that hammer, and the arrows are pinning us down!"

Hearing this, Mary ran to the other pillar, jumped onto the protruding arrow, and landed on the top of the totem. Eggman saw this and went after the girl.

"I've been waiting for this!" Eggman grinned darkly at the hedgehog.

Mary also grinned as she reached into her green jacket as the hammer fell.

"MARY!" Tails yelled as the melee weapon fell, when a flash of cyan light appeared, just before the hammer hit the stone totem.

"What!" The mad man exclaimed upon noticing the light.

Bewildered as well, Tails turned to Sonic and was about to ask a question, when he saw a second flash of light of the same color, and he looked up to see Mary, alive and well.

Eggman turned around saw the female hedgehog, who curled into a ball of spines and impacted on the Eggmoible.

"Not again!" The egg-shaped man yelled as he whirled out of the sight of the trio, and the stone totems sunk into the ground as Mary landed on the ground.

"Mary!" Tails shouted in joy as he ran up to Mary and hugged her.

"Whoa!" The yellow hedgehog exclaimed as the fox held on to her and cried into her forest green jacket.

"I thought you were gone, Mary!"

Keeping the young child close to her, Mary looked up at Sonic and asked, "Can you please find the Egg Capsule by yourself. It might take a while to calm Tails down."

"Alright." The blue hedgehog said before dashing off, leaving Tails in Mary's care.

As the two-tailed fox cried, he felt something hard in the inside pocket of Mary's jacket. Curious, he removed his face from the yellow hedgehog's jacket and asked her a question.

"What's in your pocket?"

Mary smiled and reached into her inside pocket and pulled out the cyan Chaos Emerald, surprising the fox a little. Then, Mary said, "This is the thing that saved me from being a pancake."

"Really?" Talis asked, "How?"

"I don't know the answer to that myself." Mary responded. Then, she remembered something and went into a panic.

"Oh, no! I just remembered that there was a Chaos Emerald back at the Emerald Hills! Oh, man! Now, I have to asked Sonic to go back and retreive it!"

"No, he doesn't." Tails said, causing Mary to ask.

"Why?"

Then, Tails went to his glove and pulled out a jewel that looked like an amethyst, but the shape, cut, and size of the jewel told Mary that it was the purple Chaos Emerald.

"So," Mary grinned and cocked an eyebrow, "you're the one that woke me up."

"Sorry about that." The fox smiled sheepishly, "I wasn't too sure if I could trust you guys where you arrived."

"Kinda don't blame ya for that." The yellow hedgehog said as she rubbed her quills.

Then, Sonic returned to his friends and saw the Emerald.

"Hey, where did you guys find that?"

"Well," Mary said to Sonic as she placed her hands on the young fox's shoulders, "That's something that Tails can answer."

The blue hedgehog smiled at Tails before saying, "We'll get to hear about it as soon as we reach Casino Night."

"Casino Night?" Mary asked, reminding the males that she was not from West Side Island.

"Don't worry," Sonic announced, "you'll see it soon enough."


	6. Chapter 6

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Six<p>

The sun had set, when the trio arrived at a city that looked like a giant cosino. Mary was thankful for the lights radiating from the city.

"Wow!" Mary exclaimed in awe, "It's like Star Light, but only brighter."

"Yeah." Sonic agreed.

"Dad said that West Side Island needed helped with the money," Tails explained to the curious hedgehogs, "so the islanders, who supported the idea, built it to help bring income to the island."

"Well, that's a good idea." Mary voiced her thoughts, "However, what about the others?"

"Them?" Tails asked before he responded, "Well, they either went to Casino night or stayed away from the city."

"Looks like most of the island chose to live at the city." Sonic said, still looking at the city.

Chucking, the yellow-orange fox smiled and said, "Mom wasn't too thrilled about Casino Night, but she stood by Dad's side."

"Brave woman." Mary said as she looked at Sonic, who added, "Yeah."

"We better get going; the city's probably filled with traps." Tails announced as he looked at the city.

"Better get going then." Sonic said as Mary agreed by nodding.

Once in the city, Mary called out to her friends, Sonic and Tails.

"Wait a sec!"

The males stopped and turned around. and started to asked the yellow hedgehog some questions.

"What is it?" Tails was the frist to question.

"Yeah?" Sonic agreed with the fox.

"I just needed my skates and gear." Mary answered her friends, as she pulled out the said items.

"We'll wait." Sonic said with a loud sigh.

"Of course." Tails groaned in annoyance.

"Sorry, about that, Tails." The yellow hedgehog said, "Keeping up with Sonic's easy for you, but for me, it's not that easy at times."

"Huh?"

"Mary's speed is on slow, espeically since that teleporting power of hers drains energy like that." Sonic said, ending with a snap of the fingers.

"Now," Tails said, shock at the information Sonic had told him,"Mary is weak."

"Tails, I'm not that weak." Mary spoke out. Then, she turned to the blue hedgehog and said to him, "And you, what makes you say that?"

"Well, remember the last time he fought Eggman on South Island?"

"Yeah," Mary attempted, "I had used that power three times, and after that, I was so tired that I had enough energy to see if dawn was coming."

"That's right." Sonic confirmed, "That's means you're staying close to me until you get some rest."

"Thanks." The female smiled, pleased that her dear, coblat friend was concerned.

Sonic grabbed she and dashed off into the city with Tails following behind him.

As the trio went through the city, they bounced off of green, yellow and red tiles, rode blue, steel elevators, and encountered Crawls, crab-like robots with a shield and a large pincher.

On one occasion, Mary got a shield from a Crawl, after Sonic and Tails worked together to destory it and free the animal inside. The males did not want Mary to have it, but when she said that it could protect her better, the boys dropped the subject.

Then, the three reached a huge casino, which says, 'The Robo Casino.'

"Sonic, Tails, is it just me or is Eggman advertising his location?" Mary turned to her friends as she held her new shield on her arm.

Sonic said, "He wants us to find him."

"Why?" Tails asked his male ally.

Before an answer was given, the ground disappeared from under Sonic's feet, causing the blue hedgehog to fall into the hole.

"Sonic!" Tails and Mary exclaimed in shock and concern.

The two looked at each other and ran and pushed the doors into the casino, which was empty and quiet. The two looked around and found a screen, showing Sonic in a giant pinball machine.

"Sonic!" The duo yelled again, worried for their good friend.

_"And here we are again!"_ Eggman's voice rang out to the divided groups.

Sonic was not happy at the mad man, shouting at him.

"Show yourself, Eggman!"

Hearing the azure hedgehog, Tails and Mary were outraged at the scienist.

"What's the scheme this time?" Demanded a furious Mary.

"Right!" Tails followed the example.

_"Impatient whelps,"_ Eggman's voice spoke out, _"you three should know your manners."_

"Ha," Sonic scofffed with a cocky grin, dispite his position, "look who's talking."

_"Anyway,"_ said the scienist, _"Sonic, I'm dealing with you personally."_

The hedgehog hero expressed confusion on his face as did his two friends, Mary and Tails.

_"Don't worry about your friends, Sonic."_ Eggman spoke out, _"Currently, they are in the Robo Casino, unknowingly prisoners in there."_

"What?" Mary asked, turning to the doors.

Looking at the doors, she saw a robotic reproduction of an old horror film that had zombies in it. Machine replicas of the original residents slowly and jerkingly advanced towards the casino and the duo in the empty area.

"Aw, man!" The she-hedgehog yelled, grabbing Tails's attention.

"Oh, no!" The fox exclaimed as Mary ran to the doors, which was closed.

The yellow hedgehog pulled the Crawl shield off of her arm and jammed it between the floor and the doors. The shield creaked as the doors were being pushed by the robots.

"That won't last long!" Tails pointed out to Mary, who responded, "Hopefully, it's long enough for us to find the Egg Capsule! Tails, check the higher floors, I'll take of the lower ones!"

"Right!" The fox nodded with harden eyes of resolve before he spun his tails and flew off. Mary ran off to search the bottom floor.

Meanwhile, Sonic could not see his friend or the danger that they were in, but he had his now problems, like Eggman in his Eggmoible.

"Well, Sonic, this is quite a meeting," The egg-shaped man grinned confidently, "This would be the _very_ first we have faced each other. No Uncle Chuck, no Mary, no Fox-boy, and no power rings."

"Quit talking, Eggman, you're boring me to tears!" Sonic shouted in annoyance to the older man.

Keeping his smile, Eggman said, "All right then, let's play!"

Pressing a button, the old man dropped a red spiked sphere, which fell on the floor. Then, the ball divided into two purple orbs.

Seeing this, Sonic dashed from the orbs, which exploded where it made contact to the wall. Due to the hedgehog's speed, the damage to Sonic would have been worse. Knowing this, Sonic had one thing to say.

"Things can't get worse."

Then, the Eggmobile flew towards the azure mammal, covered in electric shield.

"Things just got worse."

Back to Tails and Mary, the female just found no clue or trace of an Egg Capusle, when the Crawl shield flew passed her and hit a slot machine, earning a jackpot. However, her new fortune was the least of her concerns, because the robo-residents of the city of Casino Night were after her and Tails!

"Damn!" The hedgehog exclaimed as she claimed back her shield from the slot machine. Then, she ran off the next floor.

"Mary!" Tails yelled at the girl, "Did you find the Egg Capusle yet?"

"Not yet!"

"What are we gonna do?"

"Keep looking, and yell when you've found the machine!"

"Okay!"

Mary prayed that everything was going to be all right as she looked for the machine that kept the citizens of the city under Eggman's control.

Back to Sonic, the blue hedgehog was not doing very well, because of the Eggmobile's weapon and shield was preventing the hero to attack and he was running out of time and room to run.

"I've got to think of a plan, or my running days are over." Sonic said to himself after dodging the fifth dropped bomb.

Then, another attack was launched against the hedgehog.

Eggman grinned grimmly as he said, "You're really useless without your friends, Sonic."

Sonic could not help but agree with the mad, egg-shaped man.

In the meanwhile at the Robo Casino, Tails just discovered the Egg Capsule, when he heard Mary call out to him.

"Don't wanna be a bother, but hurry up on finding that machine and turning everyone back to normal!"

The flying fox turned his attention to Mary, who was being cornered by the robots with only the Crawl shield bewteen her and the robotic residents. Not wanting his friend to be turned into a soulless machine, Tails rushed to the machine and landed on it.

Mary was hiding behind the shield, not wanting to face her soon-to-be captors, when she heard the sounds of confused citizens. Looking over her shield, the girl saw the original, organic residents of the city.

"Whew! Tails really made it though!"

As the yellow hedgehog wiped her brow, she heard a couple of kids teasing making fun of someone, although the taunted child was not with them.

"Where's Mechanic Miles?"

"Yeah, he's probably crying his eyes out."

The girl looked around and saw the taunting duo. One was a monkey wearing a red vest, and another was a eagle wearing a lavender ascot. Mary wanted to pounce on the children, but Tails stopped her.

"Mary, go help Sonic!"

The ex-human looked at her friend, who was calling out to her and flying nearby, and nodded as she said, "You're right; I better go!"

Then, she reached for the Chaos Emerald in her jacket and sent herself away from the casino and to her friend.

As the robots were returing to normal, Sonic was in the middle of a losing battle.

"Ha, ha, ha!" Eggman mocked the weakened hedgehog, "Bye, bye, Sonic the hedgehog."

As Eggman was about to finish off Sonic, his vehicle was hit by something, causing him to enter into a spiral once again. His attacker, Mary, landed on the ground and went to Sonic, who was trying to get back onto his feet.

"Sonic, are you alright?"

"I'll be fine." Sonic replied to his rescuer, "I'm just a little tired."

Then, Mary's body fell onto Sonic's body, causing the hedgehog to panic. Sonic turned to his friend quickly to only find out that the ex-human was fast asleep. Relieved that Mary was safe, Sonic carefully placed the female onto the ground and went off to get help.


	7. Chapter 7

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Seven<p>

Mary's mind was swamped with darkness and confusion. The only thing she could see was a mirror. As she approached the looking glass, she saw herself as a human girl. Seeing her reflection, Mary examined herself and the clothes on her body.

"Wow, wasn't expecting this." Mary said as her attention turned back to the mirror.

When the female saw her reflection again, it was no longer her's but of the 'Maria' that she had visions about since that night she ran away from the orphanage weeks earlier.

"Whoa!" Mary exclaimed in suprised shock.

Then, 'Maria' reached through the mirror and grabbed Mary's wrist. Pulling with all of her might, Mary was just too weak in comparsion with the more nicely dressed and well-combed replica, who managed to pulled the semi-tomboy into the mirror.

Mary's form was now her hedgehog form, which caused her to be a little upset. She also found herself sitting at a table, which was covered with a silver tea set.

"Please, someone tell me what's going on!"

"I'll explain everything."

Hearing this, Mary turned around, but she saw no one. When the hedgehog turned back to the table, she saw 'Maria' sitting here, sipping her tea.

"Whoa!" The hedgehog yelled in fright, falling backwards. She would have fallen, if the chair had not stopped itself and returned it and the female hedgehog back up.

"Please, Mary, try to be more careful." 'Maria' announced before taking a sip from her tea cup.

"That's all you plan to say to me?" The yellow hedgehog asked, annoyed that the girl was lecturing her.

With a giggle, the human look-a-like replied with a smile

"No, Mary. There are some things I must tell, but I can't tell all of it right now."

"Then," Mary asked, "what can you tell?"

"All I can tell you now is who I am and what is to happen."

"Cryptically by my guess." Mary frowned at the girl.

"Don't worry," the human girl smiled kindly, "I'll be able to tell more in a later time."

"That's good to hear." Mary shrugged her shoulders, thinking that it was better to be told later than never.

Then, the look-a-like introduced herself to the hedgehog.

"I'm Maria Robotnik."

"Robotnik?" Mary asked. Then, she realized something very surprising!

"You're related to Eggman!"

"Yes," Maria sadly confessed, "Ivo was a sweet child, but my grandfather's imprisonment was hard for him to accept."

"Eggman? Sweet?" Mary asked, having a difficult time believing that the mad man she and her friends fought against was, at one time, a kind being.

"Now, that is over," Maria announced, "I must tell you about a part of your future."

"My future?" Mary asked Maria, who told another sip of tea before she spoke again.

"Yes. It lays in this world."

"This world, like with Sonic and Tails."

"And many others."

"Maria, that sounds great!" Mary said in excitement of making more friends.

The nicely dressed girl still smile, although the smile turned from sweet to sad as she spoke to the hedgehog.

"You might not agreed with that logic when you are given the chance to take Sonic's offer to stay with him and his uncle."

The last statement confused Mary, who tried to ask Maria, but the girl vanished from the hedgehog's sight.

"What the-?"

Then, the table and everything else cracked. The room shook, causing Mary to look for the nearest exit.

"I've heard of crashing a party, but this is overkill!" Mary announced as the room cracked and rumbled.

The room broke apart, and Mary, who did not know where to go, fell with the debris with her eyes shut, shouting out to anyone.

"HELP!"

"Mary!"

The yellow hedgehog opened her eyes and found herself in a strange bedroom. She also noticed that someone was holding on to her, which was good due to the fact that she was halfway out of the bed.

"Are you alright?"

Looking up, Mary saw Sonic, who was holding her up and preventing her from falling onto the floor. With a sheepish laugh, Mary said, "Good morning, Sonic."

The hedgehog cocked an eyebrow, and said, "Mary, look at the clock."

Mary did this and saw a clock, and the clock's hands told Mary that it was between four and six in the morning. Blusing from her own embarrassment, the female turned to Sonic and asked, "Did I wake you?"

"Yeah." The blue hedgehog answered.

"Anyone else?"

"None that I know of yet." Sonic shrugged his shoulders.

"Hope I-"

Sonic was surprised that Mary stopped her breath of relief, but he saw the reason when he looked at the door. Standing at the door was Tails, who freed a sleepy yawn.

"Tails," Mary spoke to the fox as she returned to her feet, "I'm sorry I woke you."

"It wasn't you, Mary." The child answered sadly.

"What's wrong, Tails?" Mary looked at her friend, while Sonic went to the fox, "Yeah, what's wrong, Buddy?"

The two-tailed fox looked at his friends with tear-filled eyes before he ran out of the room the hedgehogs in confusion.

* * *

><p>On the way out of Casino Night, Sonic and Mary were still worried about Tails, who refused to go with the hedgehogs out of the city.<p>

"I'm worried about Tails, Sonic." The sun-colored hedgehog announced to the azure-shaded ally, who said, "Me too."

"However," Mary added into the conversation, "I have a bad feeling about why Tails isn't with us."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, before I rescued you from Eggman, I was surrounded by a group that were recently turned back to their normal selves. Some of them must've been kids that picked on poor Tails before Eggman came to West Side Island."

"Oh!" Sonic looked surprised, "I didn't know that."

"I know." Mary nodded. Then, an idea struck her.

"Sonic?"

"Yeah?" The blue hedgehog looked at Mary with a curious expression.

"Maybe we should look for him; it's the least we could do after all we've through together."

"Yeah."

As the hedgehogs turned around to search for Tails only for find the young fox right there. The child's eyes were tear-filled, and a smiled was on his face.

"You two really think that I'm that important?"

"Uh-huh!" Mary smiled at Tails, "You're very important to us."

"Yeah," Sonic nodded in agreement, "you've gotten us out of a lot of trouble since we've met you."

The sky blue orbs strated to overflow with tears as the two-tailed fox said in a broken voice, "I can't tell you guys how I feel about that. The other kids makes fun of me, because I'm good at mechanics. You're the only ones that like me, despite being a mechanic."

"What about your parents?" Mary asked, concerned about the fox's words.

"I haven't told them."

"Boy," Sonic exclaimed with worry, "this isn't good."

"I didn't know what to do." Tails confessed, ashamed of himself, "And I was scared what they would say to me."

Mary, feeling nothing but compassion for the younger fox, went to his eye level and spoke to him in an odd motherly sense.

"Tails, your parents will listen, if they care enough. They'll supposed to love you despite any flaws that you have; if they don't, that's their loss."

The two-tailed fox looked at Mary, who revealed a sweet smile of kindness to him, and could not help himself from smiling as well. With a tear in his eye, he said, "Thanks, Mary."

"Not a problem." The sunshine-shaded hedgehog responded with a smile. Then, she had an idea, and she voiced it.

"Hey, why don't you talk to your parents. I will stay here, while Sonic goes ahead. Will that be alright with you?"

Tails liked the idea, but he was worried about Sonic's response to the plan. These fears vanished when the fox-child saw azure hedgehog's face, which had a bright smile on it. Tails turned his attention back to Mary and said, "Thanks, Mary."


	8. Chapter 8

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Eight<p>

As soon as Tails returned to Sonic and Mary, the trio went off to their next destination, which was a long way to get to by foot. As luck would have it, Rosemary, the mother of Tails, had filled Mary's basket with food and drinks, which allowed the hedgehogs and the two-tailed fox to eat as they rested.

"Wow!" Mary exclaimed in a pleased shock, "These chili dogs are awesome!"

Sonic agreed with his fellow hedgehog by saying, "Yeah! I've never had chili dogs this good."

"Thanks..." Tails blushed as he reached into the basket and pulled out a piece of candy, which caused the fox to gasp in delight, "Wow, Mom even put mint candies in there!"

"Cool." The yellow hedgehog smiled before asking, "Can I have one?"

"Sure." The fox smiled at his dear friend.

Hours later, the trio found themselves at the bottom of a very tall hill. Sonic looked at it as if it was not a challege. However, Tails and Mary were nervous about the climb.

"This is easy!" The azure hedgehog bragged out to his friends.

"Well, duh!" Mary spoke out, "It's easy for you and Tails!"

"Easier for Sonic than me." Tails corrected the female of the group.

"Either way," Mary continued to speak, "it's easy for you guys."

"I can understand way you would say that..." Sonic mused at the hill.

Tails looked at the yellow hedgehog and asked, "Mary, is there a Chaos Emerald around here?"

"Don't know." Mary replied as she pulled out the cyan gem, "But I wanna find out."

The emerald glowed brightly and in a pulse-like manner, telling all that saw it that one of the jewel's siblings was nearby.

"Looks like climbing this hill's the only option right now." The aqua-claded hedgehog announced to her allies.

The boys nodded in agreement, looking up the hill.

* * *

><p>Soon, the three youths started climbing the hill and learned soon enough that Dr. Eggman had an effect of the tall hill. The rivers ran lava with the dinosaur-like Rexons swimming in its depths, the paths were guarded by the orbs-like Golas, and the see-saws and trolleys were surrounded by the dangerous Spikers. Seeing that caused Mary and Tails to feel slighly discouraged about their chances, but Sonic was as confident as ever<p>

"If this is what Eggman's got to offer, this is gonna be a piece of cake!" Sonic bragged, not shakened by the enemies that was in the area.

Mary and Tails looked at each other; Tails had a look on his face that seemed to say, 'Is he always like this?' Mary's expressive and silent answer was 'I can't really answer that question.'

"Let's go!" The blue hedgehog turned to his allies, who shrugged their shoulders, and followed their friend into the fray.

Sonic managed to free the captured animals from the robotic shells that held them. Tails managed to help Mary, who lacked Sonic's speed and Tails's ability to fly, to evade some of the harder obstacles that presented themselves to the trio. Mary was trying to help out as much as she could, but her body was still recovering from teleporting she did the day before, which slowed her fighting capabilities.

On a short break, she was just catching her breath, when she heard Sonic call out her name. As she tried to response, a ring flew at her direction, and without a second thought, Mary caught it in mid-flight.

"Hey," Sonic expressed his awe in his fellow hedgehog's reflexes, "that's cool."

"Yeah!" An impressed Tails exclaimed as he agreed with the male hedgehog, "That's so awesome!"

"Thanks..." The sun-shaded hedgehog smiled as she placed the ring into her pocket.

Not a moment passed before a Gola tried to harm the group. All three evaded the advance, but Sonic was the one who stopped and destoryed it, freeing a small bird that flew to Tails and started talking to him.

"What's that?" Tails responded to the bird's 'words,' "Uncle Merlin said that?"

Sonic looked at Mary, who had a strong feeling what the male hedgehog's question was.

"Don't look over here, Sonic; I don't know what's going on."

A groan was freed by Sonic, who could not help but be impressed with the swiftness of Mary's wit towards him. Then, he returned his attention to Tails, who was finishing up the conversion with the bird.

"Thanks, I'll make sure I'll get to him as soon as possible."

The flying creature chripped, which sounded like a question, to Tails, who answered, "Don't worry; your family will be with you soon enough."

The bird allowed a smile on its beak before departing from the trio.

"So, what was that about, Tails?" Sonic went to the fox's side as he formed the question.

"Well, that Flicky is a friend of my Uncle Merlin," Tails explained to his friends, "and Eggman's being looking for him."

"Why?" Mary took her turn of asking questions.

"I don't know," the youngest member of the trio mused that the possiblities of the reasons why the mad doctor would seek out his uncle, "whatever it is, it can't be good."

The hedgehogs could not disagree with that fact. Both of them knew that Eggman was more likely trying to eliminate Merlin to keep him from interferring with his plans of obtaining the Chaos Emeralds.

"Then, we better find him before Egghead gets to him first!" Sonic said, now determined to find Tails's uncle.

"Yeah." Mary agreed with a firm nod, "The sooner, the better."

Tails was so happy that he started to cry again, but he tried to hide it; he knew that 'tough guys' did not cry.

"Let's go!" The speedy mammal shouted just before he ran off.

"Hey! Wait for us!" The yellow-furred she-hedgehog shouted as she ran after him as the two-tailed fox flew behind him.

* * *

><p>After the long and, in Mary's case, exhausting climb, the trio found themselves at the top of the hill, where that was supposed to be a lake of water. However, they were that Eggman had turned it into a pool of lava.<p>

"This isn't good." Mary panted out, still trying to catch her breath.

Then, Sonic saw something emerging from the lava lake, shouting, "Look!"

The other two obeyed and saw the submarine raise from the lava. Moments passed before the hatched opened and revealed the mad man in the driver's seat.

"Back off, kiddies!" The egg-shaped human shouted at them, "If you know what's good for you, don't go any farther!"

"We know what's good for us." Sonic smirked as he responded to the doctor's words, "And you in chrage of the world isn't good for anyone!"

Tails added to the statement by saying, "And you're not gonna win against us!"

Mary was impressed by the sudden bravado of the two-tailed fox and his strong words.

"Fine, have it your way!" Eggman announced before returning to the safety of his lava-resisant submarine.

Then, a gun-like weapon pointed at the trio and spewed flames at them. Sonic grabbed Mary and dogded the fire, and Tails flew up, evading the flames and the heat.

"If you pardon the pun, but this is gonna be one hot battle." Mary spoke out to her allies once they regrouped with each other.

"Yeah," Sonic nodded in agreement, "and if we don't find a way to stop him, we're cooked."

Tails felt helpless, when he remembered something. With a smile on his face, he went to Mary and whispered something into her ear.

After the idea, the female said, "That's a good idea. Better tell Sonic"

"I heard it." The blue male laughed out as he held out his hand.

Mary pulled out the ring and gave it to Sonic, who asked, "Know what to do?"

Both Mary and Tails nodded to confirm their answer.

"Then, we're ready to go." Sonic, acting like a leader, spoke out before going ahead of his friends.

Sonic entered into the range of the flame jet and shouted at the sub.

"Come on! I can do better than that!"

The flames chraged at the hedgehog, who ran out of the way.

"Hey!"

The jet 'looked' at Tails, who blowing a raspberry at the machine. Fire flew after the fox, who evaded it with far less than Sonic's speed.

Mary, however, stayed out of sight, because she was still recovered from the day before and lacked the speed and flight to be able to dodge the fire that threatened her and her friends. As long as they stuck with the plan and Eggman had no hidden surprises, Sonic should defeat Eggman in due time.

Sonic saw the opportunity to attack, when the flamethrower started to attack Tails. Grasping the ring in his hand, the blue hedgehog summoned the ring's power, which granted him additional speed. With that kind of speed, Sonic was able to use his quills to slice through the machine.

In the submarine, Eggman's systems had detected a malfunction.

"What's going on!?" The mad doctor shouted out to no one as he examined the screen that told the information about the flame jet, which Sonic had destoryed seconds earlier. "What? It's no longer pumping out fire?!"

Outside and near the pool of lava, Sonic, Tails and Mary were waiting for the right moment to execute the final part of their plan.

"Ready?" Mary whispered to the boys, who nodded to confirm to the girl.

Then, the submarine rose again, but the surface was too hot for Eggman to exit, causing the trio to wait a little longer.

"Huh?" The yellow hedgehog saw the cyan light of her Chaos Emerald.

Her exclaimation grabbed the attentions of her allies.

"Mary," Sonic spoke out first, "you better go get that Chaos Emerald."

"We'll be fine." Tails smiled at the daisy-shaded hedgehog.

The female nodded her head and went off to find the emerald that was in the area, leaving Sonic and Tails to deal with Doctor Eggman, who finally appeared from the submarine.

"Hey, you!" The mad man shouted at the departing hedgehog before Sonic chraged at the vehicle that carried the egg-shaped human and sent him flying.

"I'LL GET FOR THIIIIIIIS!" Eggman shouted as he and his Eggmoblie flew away by Sonic's power.

"All right!" Tails shouted triumphantly as he watched the forcefully departing Eggman sail from sight.

"He'll be back and soon." Sonic turned to Tails, "We better find Mary, the Chaos Emerald and a way to get the robots from the lava."

"Right..." The two-tailed fox nodded, knowing that the animals that were be freed by destorying the Egg Capsule would be burned alive.

Then, the strangest thing happened: an odd aquamarine light flowed above the ground, heading towards the lava lake. Once the light touched the pool, it engulfed the lava, and after a few moments, the lava was gone and replaced by clean and pure water.

"Whoa!" The boys were in awe of the miracle that happened before their eyes.

Meanwhile, Mary found the Egg Capusle, but she was not sure if she should press the button, worrried about the animal's safety.

Then, she heard a familar voice called out to her.

"Mary!"

"Sonic?" The yellow hedgehog turned around and saw the blue hedgehog running towards her and the Egg Capsule.

The blue blur that was Sonic leaped over Mary and landed on the machine, destorying it and freeing the captive creatures.

"Sonic!?" Mary exclaimed at the hedgehog, having not seen the lava change into water.

"It's okay, Mary." Tails spoke out to the would-be outraged Mary, who was confused by the fox's words. "The pools are now filled with water!"

"Really?" The yellow hedgehog's voice ecohed her astonishment.

The two-tailed fox nodded his head and added, "A bright light came out of nowhere and changed the lava into water!"

Mary's face started to show some form of doubt as she inqurried to the fox.

"Aren't you exaggerating maybe a little bit?"

"Nope." Sonic answered in Tails's defense, "I saw it too."

"Oh, really?" Mary's persence of calm seemed to be wavering by the males' eyes, but they chose not to pursue it, due to the fact that they needed to get the Chaos Emerald that was nearby.

"Where's the Emerald at?"

"Oh, right!"

Mary scrambled to get her Chaos Emerald out and showed to her friends. The powerful gem was even brighter than it was the previous time Mary checked it. This told them that they were really close, and they separated to search for the lone Emerald. Mary was very close to the edge of the hill's top, when she found the green Chaos Emerald.

"I found it!" Shouted the female member of the trio as she ran towards it.

Mary picked up the power jewel, but she failed to realize that she was too close to the slope and she was about to lose her balance.

"All right!" Mary's smiled beamed out, but when she stood up, her smile vanished as she fell to the ground and starting rolling down the hill.

Sonic was the first to arrival, just in time to see Mary disappear. Tails soon followed after, but he could not see Mary.

"Where did-?"

Tails never finished his question; Sonic dashed off after Mary, who was half-way to one of the hill's lakes by that time.

Mary did not know what was going on; all she knew was that she could not stop herself from rolling down the hill. She mentally bragged that the rolling would stop... Her wish was granted.

The sudden stop surprised Mary, who opened her eyes to see her rescuer, Sonic.

"Mary, you've gotta be more careful." Sonic smiled at her as his half-relieved and half-pleased voice formed the words.

"Sorry 'bout that." Mary blushed a little, "I guess I wasn't paying attention to where I was standing on."

"Yeah." The blue hedgehog laughed, pleased that his friend was okay.

"You can put me down, Sonic." Mary said, reminding Sonic that he was holding her in the bridal position, which made the male hedgehog blush.

"Sorry about that!" Sonic said, nearly dropping Mary.

In a distance, Tails was on the grass, laughing himself silly upon seeing the odd interaction of the two 'friendly' hedgehogs.


	9. Chapter 9

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Nine<p>

Once Sonic, Mary and Tails composed themselves and reached the bottom of the hill, they made their way to an entrance of a dark cave.

"What a creepy cave!" Mary exclaimed in slight fright.

"Don't worry so much!" Tails interjected his thoughts to the female hedgehog, "It's the Mystic Cave!"

"The Mystic Cave?" Mary was still very unfamiliar of the world she was in.

Sonic was the one who answered the question.

"The Mystic Cave is where wizards go to train themselves...usually."

"Usually?" The yellow mammal looked at Sonic in a small moment of confusion.

"Sometimes, it's also used as an hideout."

This confused the ex-human greatly.

"If this is supposed to be a hideout for magic users, why do you and Sonic know about it?"

"Easy," Sonic half-boasted as he turned to the girl, "Tail's uncle, Merlin, is a wizard, which allows Tails to know about the cave. I, on the other hand, learned this from Uncle Chuck, who was friends with Merlin."

"Oh, yeah." Mary withdrew to her thoughts, "That makes sense."

The males smiled at Mary before they entered the Mystic Cave.

Mary was a little nervous about entering the dark cave, but she managed to gather the courage to follow her friends into the cave. Once inside, she could not see anything or anyone, and this started to dampen her resolve to follow her friends.

"Sonic? Tails? Where are you? I can't see anything!"

"Don't worry." Sonic's voice echoed off the walls of the cave, "You will in a moment."

"What?" The girl questioned her ally's reasoning.

Then, lights started appearing from nowhere and lit up the cave. This allowed Mary to see Sonic and Tails with slight difficultly.

"Okay, I see what you mean." Mary blushed, although her friends could not see her face.

"Come on, Mary!" Tails shouted out to the female hedgehog, "We have to stay together, or you'll get lost."

"Right!" Mary ran after her friends, and when she caught up with them, she grabbed Sonic's hand; she did not want to get lost in a wizard's hiding spot.

* * *

><p>After some time in the Mystic Cave, the young trio managed to stay together. They found a place to rest for a while.<p>

"Wow..." Mary said, in awe of the beauty of the underground crystals.

The others, more accustomed to the lights than Mary, took a good look and also joined in the admiration of the only sources of light in the cave.

"Yeah, they are kinda cool." Sonic rubbed his nose as if something was in it, "We tend to ignore the simple things in life when we get older."

"You can say that again, Sonic." Mary nodded her head, causing her messy quills to shake a little.

"But it's always a good thing to stop and watch the crystals." Tails smiled as he laughed at his own joke.

The hedgehogs understood the pun and responded to it.

"No offense to you, Tails," Mary said, "but you should have said 'smell the roses.'"

"Yeah." The male shrugged his shoulders.

"I had to try." The two-tailed child smiled sheepishly at his friends.

"Tails, you should stick to your gadgets." An older voice rang out, grabbing the trio's attentions.

"Sonic," Mary turned to the blue mammal, "who was that?"

The speedy hedgehog noticed that his female companion was unmistakably frightened by the sudden announcement of the voice. So, he spoke to Mary to calm her nerves.

"Don't worry, I think that's Merlin." Then, he turned to Tails and asked him, "Right, Tails?"

"That's right." A smiling fox confirmed with a nod.

Then, an odd wind roared throughout the cave. The trio shielded themselves from the strong gust of wind, only to see a cloaked figure once the wind died down.

"Uncle Merlin!" Tails cried out with joy as he ran towards the hooded figure and hugged it.

"It's good to see you too, Miles." The uncle smiled before he removed his hood from his face.

"So, you're Merlin Prower!" Mary announced loudly, making the echo that rang throughout the cave.

"That's correct, young lady." The hooded fox turned to the yellow hedgehog, "Now, follow me. We have many things to talk about."

"Right!" Sonic agreed with a nod.

Then, the group departed for the deeper parts of the Mystic Cave.

* * *

><p>Outside of the cave, Doctor Eggman was searching for the trio by using a Chaos Emerald detector of his own design. He knew very well that Tails was the nephew of the most powerful wizard of West Side Island, Merlin.<p>

"This has to be a very brilliant idea to allow those troublemaking kids to lead me right to Merlin."

As the radar continued to scan for the Emeralds, the egg-shaped man decided to relax a bit. After all, he was going to need it, if he planned to take the Chaos Emeralds and the two-tailed Merlin.

* * *

><p>Soon, the trio, which were led by Merlin, reached a small pool, which seemed to be colored by the underground lights that surrounded it. The sight was a wonder by itself.<p>

"Miles," the wizard turned to his nephew, "do you remember the story that I've told you when you were younger about the Oracle of the Mystic Cave?"

"Yes, I do." The young fox confirmed to his uncle.

"Well," the magicain looked at the others with a gleam in his eye, "this is the Oracle."

"The Oracle!?" Tails exclaimed upon hearing the statement, and his friends, Sonic and Mary, were just as shocked.

"What are you talking about, Merlin?" Sonic loudly inquiried the wizard, "I thought the Oracle's a person."

The wizard smiled casually at the young male hedgehog as Merlin spoke again.

"Yes, I was just as surprised as you three are when I first figured it out, but now I know that this very pool of water is the Oracle."

"How can that be?" Mary asked the uncle of Tails after she regained her composure.

The older fox smiled before he replied to the female member of the trio.

"Well, let's ask the Oracle."

"How?" A skeptic Sonic rose an eyebrow at the elder fox.

"Mary, I'm going to need your help with that."

"Me?" The sun-shaded hedgehog was dumbfounded by the request, "Why?"

"Don't worry." Merlin spoke to calm the girl, "You're going to do fine."

"Okay..." Mary said, still unsure, "How can I help?"

"Just stand over here, by the edge of the pool."

"All right..."

The young hedgehog did what she was told and continued to do this when Merlin gave Mary more instructions.

"Do you have a Chaos Emerald?"

"Yes." The ex-human answered with a confused look at the wizard.

"Drop it into the pool."

"What?" The hedgehogs looked at the magical fox.

"You'll see very soon." Merlin grinned at the older members of the trio, while Tails giggled a little.

Sonic and Mary looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders. Not knowing what else to do, they silently agreed to do as the magician said.

Mary, after returning her attention to the Oracle, pulled out her cyan Emerald and dropped it into the pool.

When the jewel touched the water, it glowed and went upright, only causing a few ripples on the water's surface. Once the Chaos Emerald was upright on the surface, the pool started to glow the same color of the gem.

"What's going on?" Sonic and Mary asked the wizard, who said, "Just watch."

The trio of friends looked on and watched the Chaos Emerald with the magical uncle of Tails.

Inside the body of water, an image of an island appeared before the small group.

"That's West Side Island!" Exclaimed the youngest member of the Prower clan.

"That's correct, Miles." The elder fox confirmed his nephew's assumsation, "Now, look at the the darken places on the island. That's where Robotnik's damage to the island in his search of the Chaos Emeralds."

"But why here?" Mary asked, turning to the cloaked fox, "I can understand if it was my and Sonic's fault by causing his hovercraft to go haywire."

"No," the elder spoke out, "it's because of our history."

"Your history?" Mary asked the wizard. The yellow hedgehog turned to Sonic and asked, "Do you know what's he's talking about?"

With a disheartening sigh escaping his lips, the blue hedgehog answered Mary's question, knowing that Mary might not like the answer.

"Well, West Side Island is known by another name: the Island of Illusions. It was called that because that a group of people, who were guests to this isle were abusing the power of the Chaos Emerald, dispite the calm look it had. One day, the power of the Emeralds got out of control and..."

"Wait!" The female hedgehog put up her hands at her friend, "Let me finish: this island nearly destoryed in the pursuit of power, but now it's a peaceful place to live, until Eggman came here."

"That's right." The hedgehog nodded in agreement with his friend.

"However," Merlin intervened, "there is another part of the story."

"What's that?" The hedgehogs looked at Tails's uncle.

"There was a legend that this group brought to this very island." Merlin explained to the younger trio, "It is said that two hedgehogs would could and be able to unite the Chaos Emeralds together, awakening an ancient power long forgotten."

"An ancient power?" Sonic looked at Mary, who shrugged her shoulders and replied, "Don't ask me."

"I believe I can provide an answer to that inquiry." The cloaked fox smiled as he waved a hand to the Oracle.

With their attentions turned to the glowing pool of water, they saw the image of the island change into another vision; this one showed Mary's form. Mary backed off a little before the Oracle of the Mystic Cave showed her actions earlier that day.

The vision showed that Mary was playing with her Chaos Emerald by throwing it into the air and catching it. However, she did miss it one time, and the result of the Emerald falling to the ground was a wave of cyan light visually echoing on the ground. This shocked the young girl, who picked up the gem and ran off to find the Egg Capsule.

At the end of the vision, the boys turned to a tangerine-shaded Mary, who had tears in her eyes.

"Mary," Tails spoke to her, "why didn't you tell us?"

"I-I-I-"

Then, a rumble shook the earth that surrounded them and the pool that was the Oracle of the Mystic Cave. This warned them that Eggman was coming for them.

"Get ready!" Sonic spoke out to his allies, which they obeyed.

Mary summoned the cyan gem to her side, and Tails was in the battle stance.

Then, little bug-like robots crawl out of the holes that were created in the rumbling of the cave.

"Flashers!" Tails shouted out as he pointed at them.

"Miles, you know it's impolite to point!" The uncle scolded the younger fox. Then, he said as he attention was turned to the flashing robots, "Now, for these robots..."

The hooded wizard waved his hand, and a white light covered everyone of the Flashers, freeing all of the creatures that was being controlled by Eggman. The older fox smiled, pleased with his work as he watched the animals flee from the cave.

"Now, we have to depart from here." Merlin spoke; his voice now stern and direct, "It will not be long before Eggman finds us."

The trio had no disagreement with Merlin with that statement. All three departed from the pool's resting place. Once all members of the group left, the Oracle glowed again, healing the walls and sealing itself from any other dangers.

* * *

><p>After sometime running and fending off Flashers and Crawlton, blue centipede-like robots, the four made their way to the exit of the Mystic Cave.<p>

"Sunlight at last!" Mary gleefully sighed in relief.

"Yeah!" Tails jumped with the same form of joy as Mary's.

"Yeah, but..." Sonic spoke out, unsure about the exit.

"We should be ready." Merlin seemed to read the blue hedgehog's mind, "Eggman might attack at any moment!"

"You can say that again, Merlin!" Eggman's voice rang throughout the cave, "This is your only warning: surrender or pay the price!"

"How much?" Merlin asked in a joking manner, "I lack much money."

The joke caused Merlin's nephew and his friends to giggle at the joke. Eggman, however, was not amused in the slightest bit.

"Make all of the jokes you want, Merlin, but when you're in a cage, waiting to be turned into one of my robots, I'll be the one laughing!"

This announcement caused the young trio to roll their eyes, shaking their heads at the mad scienist's words.

"And I'll make you believe me on this!" Eggman shouted as the cave shook.

"Sounds like it's the herald of Eggman." Mary said, looking around for the doctor and holding on to her pack's straps.

Then, a familiar shape fell to the cavern, nearly sending everyone to the ground from the shock it machine caused. This brought great concern upon the four.

"This isn't looking good." Tails spoke out, glaring at the machine as its owner appeared from the top of it.

"Ha, ha! See how you tremble at the mighty Ivo Robotnik!" Boasted the "Bad Egg" as he looked down at fox-wizard, "I'm not going to be nice about your capture."

"Don't hold your breath." Mary spoke out loudly, which interrupted the bragging of the doctor.

"I heard that." Eggman turned to Mary's direction, which Sonic was coming from and at Eggman! With a yelp from being startled, the mad man ducked dodging the sneak attack before exclaiming at the trio, "If that's how you want to play it, let's take it to the next level!"

He dove into the Egg Mobile and activated a pair of drills that were in the front. This sight did little to discourage from the battle that awaited them.

"Please!" The yellow hedgehog rolled her blue eyes again, "If this didn't work before, what makes you believe that it would the next time?"

Then, the machine directed the drills to the ceiling and, using a rocket, drilled through it. This action caused the hanging stalactites to drop to the ground. Luckfully for Mary, Sonic grabbed her just in time. Merlin used a spell to protect himself and Tails from the falling rock spikes.

"That's a good response." A shakened Mary smiled sheepishly after being saved by Sonic.

The blue male did not know what to do to stop Eggman, but he knew that he had to fight to save his friends. So, he waited for Eggman to make his again... Sonic did not wait for very long as Eggman's machine nearly flattened him as well as a few rocks.

"All right." Sonic cocked a smile, "This is the end game for you in this cave!"

Sonic spun into a ball and chraged at the drilling machine, which evaded the hedgehog's attack.

"What?" Sonic exclaimed in shock.

"What's the matter, Sonic?" Eggman's voice mocked the speedy hedgehog, "I've learned to make my machines faster, so you're out of luck!"

Hearing this disheartened the group, but Sonic refused to give up as he continued to fight.

Mary, however, wished that Sonic would back off so they could come up with a plan together.

"Mary," the wizard reached the yellow hedgehog's side, "you're worried about him."

"Yeah," Mary refused to deny that sentense, "He's one of my best friends!"

"I know." The hooded male nodded to her, "Take this."

The old fox waved a golden power ring in front of the girl, who took it as Merlin spoke again.

"That's for you and Sonic."

"You want us to work together?" Mary asked before adding a smile and stating, "Fine with me."

"Hey!" Tails broke between his friend and uncle. Turning to Mary, the youngest of the Prower clan demanded, "Why can't I help?"

"You can help, Tails." Mary went to Tails's eye level, "You can help by staying out of the way; it could be dangerous to you and your uncle as well to Sonic and myself."

Tails casted his sky blue eyes to the ground, saying in a dishearted tone, "Okay."

"Tails," Mary gently lifted the child's head up, "if you got hurt, we'd never forgive ourselves for it."

The young fox took a moment to review and realized that he would have felt the same way if anything had happened to his friends. With this realization in his mind, Tails's morale renewed it his heart. He nodded his head and said, "Right!"

"Don't worry, Mary." Merlin spoke to the motherly hedgehog, "he'll be safe with me. Just remember, both of you must be holding on to the ring. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir!"

"Now, if excuse us," Merlin spoke as his hand grabbed his nephew's shoulder, "I want to see the fireworks, but not this close."

Then, a blast of wind flew by, blocking Mary's view. Once it was regained, the female hedgehog saw that her friend and the wizard was gone.

"Good exit." Mary said before dodging another rock that was falling from the ceiling.

"Mary!" Sonic yelled out at his friend. He ran to her and asked, "Why didn't you go with them?"

But before Mary could answer, the machine Eggman was driving fell onto the ground, causing more pieces of rock to fall. Both the hedgehog managed to avoid any injury to their bodies, but this divded them as a group.

"This isn't looking good!" Sonic hissed loudly, seeing that Eggman was going to win a battle.

"Sonic!" Shouted Mary, who held up the power ring.

The blue hedgehog looked and smiled, pleased about seeing the golden hoop. He started off to Mary to grabbed it, but the Egg Mobile fell down, sending Sonic off-balance and almost off-course.

Mary gasped upon seeing her friend in trouble, so she ran to him, holding out the power ring. Sonic saw the ring and grabbed it.

In that moment, a bright, golden light engulfed the cave and spreaded out of the cave, allowing Tails and Merlin to see it.

"What's that, Uncle Merlin?" Tails asked in awe of the light.

"That, my dear nephew, is the confirming sight of my suspicions." Merlin spoke as he removed his hood, revealing his gray beard.

Inside the Mystic Cave, Eggman, confused from not being able to see the hedgehogs, exited from the safety of his Egg Mobile to see what was going on at first. What he saw shook him to his core: a spinning wheel of light.

"What's going on here!?" The mad man demanded to know, but when the wheel started advancing towards him, he realized that he was much safer inside of his machine, saying, "Time to go!"

Before he could depart from the caverns, the vortex spun towards him and made impact onto the machine. However, the wheel did not destory it, but it pushed the Egg Mobile all of the way out of the Mystic Cave. Once outside, the wheel pushed the mad doctor's machine and sent it into the air. Then, with one bounce, it entered the air after the Egg Mobile and sliced it into two pieces, mere moments after Doctor Eggman escaped the wheel's wrath.

"I'm going to get you one of these days!" Eggman swore revenge against the wheel, before one half of the attachment hit the side of his Egg Mobile, sending him flying to another part of the island.

The wheel floated in mid-air, when it changed into its true forms: Mary and Sonic. They were happy about their victory against Eggman, but they forgot something very important: they could not fly. As they fall to the ground, a sudden wind blew under them and stayed beneath them until their feet touched the ground.

"Wow! That was close!" Mary sighed out in relief before freeing a laugh from her lips.

"Yeah! You can say that again!" Sonic joined his friend in the laughter.

They laughed until they noticed Merlin and Tails approaching them.

"Mary! Sonic!" The young, two-tailed fox ran to his friends, "I'm so glad that you're still alive!"

"Us too!" Mary laughed out to the fox, who hugged her upon arrival.

"Well done, you two." Merlin congradulated the hedgehogs for their deal, "I knew you two would make it."

"Thanks." The hedgehogs spoke in unison.

Tails, remembering what his uncle had said earlier, turned to Merlin and asked, "What did you mean by suspicions?"

"Well, Miles," the wizard laughed a little as he spoke, "these two, your friends, are the hedgehogs of the legend: the Warrior and the Mage."

"Hey, that's my favorite story!" Tails exclaimed out aloud.

"The Warrior and the Mage?" Sonic and Mary looked at each other in their confusion.

"Yes," the cloaked fox nodded to the duo, "I'll explain it on the way to the Oil Ocean."

"The Oil Ocean?" Mary gasped before she said, "That must be Eggman's creation!"

"Yes," Merlin confirmed the guess, "and it is the only way to enter Metropolis without grabbing more of the converted citizens of the isle."

"Oh, boy..." The sun-shaded hedgehog nervously replied as she and her allies started their journey to the Eggman-made area.


	10. Chapter 10

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Ten<p>

After a few hours of travel, Sonic, Mary, Tails and Merlin reached their next destination: the Oil Ocean.

"How horrible!" Mary exclaimed in disgust upon seeing the refineries off the shore.

"I know it's disheartening," Merlin spoke out to Mary, "but it's how Eggman is powering Metropolis."

"Metropolis?" Sonic turned to the wizard, who answered, "This is where the doctor is working on his latest weapon."

"That's not good!" Sonic's female partner announced, which the other males agreement without any question.

"Then, we go to Metropolis." Sonic looked at the refineries.

"Right." Mary and Tails said in confirmation.

"I will go to Casnio Night and help out anyway I can." Merlin announced to the younger three, "But first... Mary, take this."

The old fox reached into his robe and pulled out the red Chaos Emerald, which within the same action gave it to the yellow hedgehog.

"All right." Mary said to the wizard, as she took the jewel and put it into her backpack, "Good luck."

"Same to you." The elder of the four said with a smile as the wind started kicking up.

After a few moments, the wind died down, and Merlin was gone.

"Well, we're on our own again." Mary announced blantly.

"Yeah," Sonic agreed before adding, "but it makes things interesting."

The she-hedgehog took a moment to look at her male counterpart with a serious expression of her face, and then she relaxed as she verbally agreed with her friend.

"I guess you're right."

"Then, let's go!" Tails hopped up and down with excitement.

With that, the two-tailed child whipped his tails, flew to Mary, who grabbed the fox-child's offered hand, and took her to one of the refineries that littered the ocean. As he flew in the air, Tails noticed that Sonic was willing to stay at the shore.

"Don't worry, Tails." Mary's voice cooed out to the fox, "He'll be alright."

The fox could not help himself from smiling, but also he still felt worried about the blue hedgehog. This worry continued to gnaw at the fox, when he dropped off Mary at the nearest oil refinery.

Mary, once her feet was on the metal of the structure, noticed that her younger friend was very worried by the expression on his face. She knew that Tails was concerned about Sonic's safety, even though she didn't see much use for that much concern for the hedgehog. Yet, the thought reminded her of her own concern for her friend on her first adventure with Sonic. Mentally kicking herself, Mary turned to Tails and spoke to him.

"Tails, I won't worry too much about Sonic; he's been fighting Eggman since he was younger."

Another smile appeared on the fox's face, but it was weaker than the last one. Then, he flew off, leaving Mary and the Chaos Emeralds that the trio hd collected.

* * *

><p>Sonic was back at shore, waiting for Tails to pick him up and recalling what Merlin had told them on the way to the Oil Ocean: the legend of West Side Island.<p>

Merlin told that where the isle was in great danger, two individuals, which were not natives of the island, would appear and rid the whole island of the evil that took residence there. One was a warrior blessed by the wind at birth. His ally and companion would be a mage of the element of water, which was based on the color of the Chaos Emerald that person had.

"Man, that is really weird." The azure-shaded hedgehog announced to himself, "But it's kinda cool that Mary and I are part of an anicent legend."

The thoughts raced through his mind as they changed towards the people that gave the alias "Island of Illusions" to West Side Island.

The group was the source of the problems of the events of the present, but they probably thought they were doing a great good, not a terrible evil. However, it was safe to say that they are not the ones stirring up trouble at the present time.

Then, the blue hedgehog shrugged his shoulders and said, "Maybe I'll learn the truth, if not someone else... someday."

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of Tails in flight. The young hedgehog looked in the sky and saw the younger fox landed nearby. Sonic went to his ally and discovered that Tails was tired from his trip.

"You okay?" Sonic asked with a concerned tone to the fox, who was under the age of ten.

"I'm okay," Tails replied with a weak smile, "I'm just need to rest..."

In the middle of his statement, the fox cub fell into an exhaustion-induced slumber. Thankfully, Sonic was there to catch Tails in his fall.

"Don't you worry, little buddy," the teenaged hedgehog said to the tired child, "I'll make sure that you get some rest before we meet up with Mary. I just hope she understands."

* * *

><p>Back at the oil refinery that she was dropped off at, Mary was ready to venture throughtout the many refineries, which Dr. Robotnik had made, to find the next Chaos Emerald and to halt the mad man's plans of globial domination.<p>

"Dang it!" Mary shouted in frustration, nearly stamping her roller blade onto the metal floor, "This is not what I had in mind when Tails went back for Sonic!"

As she waited and calmed herself, the yellow hedgehog removed her backpack and pulled out her cyan Emerald, which was glowing in a pulse-like manner. Seeing this, Mary knew that another Chaos Emerald was nearby, maybe on one of the metal refineries that spanned over that part of the sea.

"Well, I know that I'm on the way path." Mary said as she returned the Emerald back with its siblings, "Now, the problem is how am I going to get to the next Chaos Emerald?"

She was given no answer, but an octopus-like robot hopped up, landed next to Mary, and gave her an angry look.

The hedgehog saw this and said to herself, "However, I do know when to start!"

As she turned around to flee, the robot spat out a fireball at Mary, who jumped out of the way. She watched as the fireball extinguished itself before it landed into the mixture of crude oil and sea water. The feat was amazing, but she was more concerned about her safety than how a fireball was not on fire by the time it reached the Oil Ocean.

The yellow hedgehog continued to make an attempt to escape the fire-spewing robot, Mary noticed that she was running out of room to ran! Halting was a second nature to her at that time, and it saved her from an unneeded oil bath.

"Man!" Mary said as she wiped the beads of sweat from the uncovered part of her brow, "That was too close for comfort!"

Then, she remembered that an octopus-robot was chasing after her under the indirect command of the mad Dr. Eggman!

"Things can't get any more worse!" Mary exclaimed as she turned to face the hopping sea creature aim at her.

Mary started to pray in her mind as the octopus was ready to fire at her.

"For West Side Island and the world!"

Mary looked at and saw a brown and blue blur fall onto the robot, which started hopping up and down to remove its own attacker off of it. The brown being put something on the pink robot's head and jumped off of it. The robot was ready to fire at its assailant, but it short-circuited, causing it to revert back to its small creature form, which was a little fish. As quickly as it attacked the creature in its roboticized form, the brown and blue being picked it up and put it in a container that was just big enough to allow it to swim around a little.

"Whoa!" The girl hedgehog was in awe of what she saw, "That's a way to get job done."

"You can say that again." The being replied without looking at Mary.

The voice sounded male and caused the hedgehog to hear a smile from the tone of voice as she watched her rescuer tinker with the fish's container, which turned into a miniature helicopter and flew off to the distant shore of West Side Island.

"I'm just glad that I'm not the only one stuck here anymore." The being turned to Mary to reveal that she was a squirrel with brown and tan fur wearing a blue vest and matching boots.

"How did you get stuck here?" The female hedgehog asked, curious about the events that led to the squirrel's predicament.

"Where do I start?" The male in brown fur shrugged his shoulders.

"How about when Eggman took over?"

"Good idea." The squirrel squeaked out of embarrassment. Then, he cleared his throat and told his story.

"It started like any other day; kids playing, adults working and all that stuff. Then, all of a sudden, Eggman comes down here, turns most of the animals and cretures here into robots and builds all of this mess; I can't believe at one point of my life that I'd wanted something to break up the boredom!"

"'Kay..." Mary felt a little confused, "How did you end up on one of Eggman's refineries?"

"Oh, right!" The male mammal blushed a little, "Well, after Eggman attacked the island, me, my cousin and a pal of his formed a small band of fighters for freedom. My cousin found out that the oil refineries had a powerful source of energy controlling them. I volunteered to go get the power source, and I successfully completed the mission. However, I've failed to see a major side effect when I removed it from the refinery maintenance mainframe."

"Major side effect?" Mary eyed the squirrel, knowing very well the he was talking about the environmental mess that was the Oil Ocean.

"Yeah; that's my fault." The rodent confessed with a blush on his face.

With a deep breath, Mary spoke her mind.

"What you've done is caused a major disaster, not a side effect. However, with a lack of knowledge that could have appropriate for this mission is no reason to be very upset, just annoyed."

"What can I say, besides 'I'm sorry?'" The male squirrel grinned sheepishly.

Mary shook her head and gave a smile to the rodent as she said, "Maybe make a promise to clean up the mess as soon as you can?"

Liking the sound of the idea, the squirrel said, "I like that idea very much. Thanks, Miss..."

"My name's Mary Allenson." The yellow hedgehog laughed at herself for forgetting to introduce herself to the new friend. Then, she asked, "What's your name?"

"Name's Ricky Oak."

"Nice to meet you, Ricky." Mary offered a hand, which her new friend took and shook. Then, she reailzed something about him.

"Hey, have you been going from refinery to refinery?"

"Ha, that's easy." Ricky started bragging upon hearing the question, "If they're close enough, I just leap from one to the other, but if one of the refineries were too far, I'd hutch a ride with an Aquis or an Octus."

"But they're badniks." Mary exclaimed in shock of the brazen action.

"That's a problem to most people, but for me, it's a matter of timing and remembering to have a back-up plan."

Mary paused for a moment to think about the reasoning before she made her statement.

"I do see the possiblities of such a crazy series of actions."

"Yeah!" Ricky nodded as he wrapped an arm over Mary's shoulders.

"Hey, hands off!" Mary hissed out as she slapped the squirrel's hand.

"Ow!" Ricky pulled back his hand from Mary.

The young hedgehog looked at the squirrel and said, "Don't touch me like that again!"

Sensing the daggers that were Mary Allenson's eyes, Ricky started defend himself.

"Hey, you're the first girl I've seen as a living creature since this mess came to West Side Island. You can't blame me for wanting-"

"Hold it right there, pal!" Mary thrushed her face to the front of the squirrel's face, "You're right about the wanting, but I can blame you for grabbing me."

"But-but-but-" Ricky tried to speak to the female, but Mary did not allow him to answer.

"But nothing!"

The hedgehog turned from the rodent, furious about Ricky's actions. The last thing Mary wanted to do was enter an argument with one of her rescuers.

Then, a rumbling was felt by the only living mammals on the refinery.

"What going on?!" Ricky was in shock and confused as he tried to maintain his balance.

Mary, who was on the ground and supporting herself by her hands and knees, was less confused and more aware of the situation as she answered the question.

"I'm pretty sure what's about to happen to us."

"What's that?" Ricky heard the question, but Mary would not be able to answer due to a harpoon penetrating through the metal floor of the massive refinery.

"Whoa! That was way too close!" Mary exclaimed, while trying to keep herself from fainting from fright.

Then, the harpoon went down and started pulling on the refinery, which cause the platform to fall to the oily waters, taking the two mammals with it. Upon impact, the metal flooring was made slick by the oil and water mix, making escape difficult for the newly-formed duo.

"Yuck!" The oil-drenched squirrel shook himself to attempt some oil removal on his fur, "I wish I had known what was going to happen when I pulled out that gem!"

"Gem?" Mary know immediately what the squirrel was talking about: the Chaos Emerald!

Then, the one part of the platform started to sink. This caused the mammals to to slide down towards the sinking end.

"Oh, no!" Ricky shouted as he tried to use the flooring to keep himself from sliding into the crude-filled seas.

"Whoa!" Mary exclaimed as she held on to the floor as well.

However, the hedgehog lost her grip and slipped. Thankfully, Mary managed to grab the proturding projectile. Managing to keep herself from slipping off the weapon, the hedgehog placed her footing onto the weapon and used the floor to keep herself from sliding farther down towards the Oil Ocean.

"Mary!" Ricky shouted as he carefully allowed gravity to do its job so he could reach her.

Mary smiled at the squirrel as he made his approach towards her. This causes Mary to calm down a little bit as she removed one of her arms from one of her backpack's straps and threw the sack from her back to front. Opening the bag from behind, Mary's hand scrambled around for her Chaos Emerald.

"What are you doing?" Ricky demanded to know out of confusion and concern as he watched the she-hedgehog attempt to grab something from her backpack.

"Let's just say that you're not the only one with a back-up plan." Mary smiled as her fingers sensed the power in her Emerald.

"What are you talking about?!"

Mary cooly looked at Ricky and said, "I'm just going to return the rescue."

* * *

><p>Back at the shoreline, Tails stirred a little before awaking from his slumber.<p>

"Oh, man..." The young fox rubbed his head, which seemed to pulse in pain, "I feel bad..."

"You can say that again." A new voice rang out to the young vulpine, startling him.

Tails looked at a squirrel with gold-yellow fur, tanned skin and dark-blue eyes. A small tuft of hair curled at the tip, making it look like it was tear-shaped. It wore white gloves and shoes and socks that looked similar to Sonic's sneakers and socks.

"Who are you?" Tails managed to ask, but failed to maintain the tough tone of voice.

"The name's Ray." The squirrel answered with a kind-looking grin, "I'm an old pal of Sonic's."

"You know Sonic?" The young fox was shocked to here about another person being a friend of the blue hedgehog.

"That's right."

The new voice grabbed both yellow-furred mammals, causing them to see an armadillo with black fur, red armor-like skin that started from the brow of his head to over his tail. The armadillo's attire of clothing consisted of same articles of clothing as Ray.

"Mighty!" The squirrel smiled upon seeing the plated mammal, who could not help but laugh at Ray's reaction.

"Yeah, I'm here, Ray."

A familiar chuckle was heard nearby, which caused the young two-tailed fox to leap to his feet and ran over to the chuckle's source: Sonic.

"Sonic, who are these guys?" The male fox demanded of his friend out of fear.

"Don't worry about them; they're my pals from Christmas Island." Sonic replied to the worry-filled question, "The three of us are a team a couple of years ago."

"Emphasis of a couple." The crimson and black armadillo commented about the statement.

"Yeah." The blue hedgehog started to feel akwarad, which was something Sonic was not familiar to deal with at all.

The childhood friends of Sonic, seeing the expression on the hedgehog's face, started to laugh at the poor mammal, who was renowned for being cool under pressure.

However, the laughter ended when a cyan light appeared and shortly blinded the four of them. The light soon subsided and reveal two forms on the ground and covered with oil crude.

"Mary!" The fox shouted out to his friend, while Ray ran to the other being, yelling out, "Ricky!"

Sonic and Mighty followed their respective friends as they went to the crude-coated mammals.

"I'm okay." Mary moaned as she managed to return the Chaos Emerald back into her sack.

"Me too." Coughed Ricky before he sat up.

"What happened to you guys." Mighty spoke out the question, which Mary was quick to answer.

"Eggman! The refinery that Ricky and I were on was pulled down to the sea!"

"Oh, no!" Tails exclaimed in his shock, "You're lucky to have escaped from that mess."

"With a little help." Mary winked at the youngest member of the now-group of six.

This little bit of knowledge, which Tails knew very well, caused the young fox to smile a little. Ray, Mighty and Ricky were simply confused about the secret message between Mary and Tails.

"Come on, guys!" Sonic announced to his friends, "Eggman's up to no good again!"

"Yeah!" Mighty and Ray nodded to the hedgehog.

"I wish I could come too," Mary struggled to stand up, "but I was in a panic when I used my powers to escape with Ricky. Besides, Tails is too tired to fly, and I'm very sure that Ricky doesn't want to go back to the refinery."

"You can say that again, Mary." The brown rodent replied as he tried to squeeze the oil out of his tail.

"Right." Sonic agreed, "But what are we going to do without a power ring?"

"Fortunately," the gold-yellow squirrel spoke out, "I've got one right here..."

"Thanks, Ray." The blue hedgehog smiled as the young squirrel pull out and gave the ring to Sonic.

"No problem, Blue Blur!"

"Blue Blur?" Tails was basically confused about the alias of the male hedgehog.

Mary, on the other hand, was not at all surprised about the nickname. She stated frankly, "Man, with Sonic's speed, that kind of nickname's bond to stick on a guy."

Mighty, a long time friend of Sonic's, started laughing at Mary's and Tails's different reactions to Sonic's alias. The response that the young fox gave off was not much of a surprise, but the female hedgehog's nonchalance to the name Ray gave Sonic years ago was a bit of a surprise. That caused him to see the difference between the reactions.

Sonic and Ray were more worried about the mad doctor than noticing the difference of reactions to an old nickname.

"I better get a head start." Ray said to the hedgehog, who said, "I'll give you about a mintue before you can pick me up."

"Right, Sonic." The squirrel nodded before he ran off, jumped into the air and stretched out his arms, allowing the skin membrane to catch the wind; this gave Ray the ability to fly.

Mary could not help herself from being curious about Sonic's and Ray's plan, so she turned to the one person who might know what was going on.

"Excuse me, but do you know what Sonic and the flying squirrel have planned for Eggman?"

Mighty, the receiver of the inquiry, was polite in his respond, saying, "Of course, you see, Sonic and Ray made up this technique back when the soft-boiled scienist caught the three of us a few years ago, but I can't help but be a little surprised about them using that plan again."

Mary mused at the thought for a moment before she spoke again, stating, "Well, let's see if their faith in that idea is in a good direction."

The armadillo and the female hedgehog with Ricky and Tails watched Sonic as the blue hedgehog readied himself for the plan between him and Ray.

After a few seconds, the Blue Blur started running towards the sea, a course of action Sonic would normally refuse to do, and once he was close enough, the hedgehog activated the power ring, which allowed him to run over the oil-filled ocean and straight towards a certain scienist and his personal vehicle.

"Where did those two go?" The doctor known as Eggman asked before he remembered a very important about Mary Allenson.

"Oh, no! Darn it! Darn it! Darn it! How could I, Doctor Ivo Robotnik, have forgotten about that girl's connetion with the Chaos Emeralds so easily!?"

As the doctor hopped up and down in his Egg Mobile, kicking himself for his forgetfulness, a signal appeared on his radar, telling anyone who read it that something was coming towards Eggman in a high-fast speed.

"What!?" The mad man stopped his childish rant and looked at the radar's screen. The blinking dot was closing in on him!

Eggman looked from the detection device and to the Oil Ocean, where he saw a blue blur of the oily waters.

"Curses! It's that hedgehog again!" The scienist hissed through his teeth, before a nasty grin warpped his face as he added, "I've got a little surprise for that pesky rodent this time."

Returning to his seat properly, the doctor pressed a button, which caused a gun-like weapon to appear from the submarine's side. He readied the locking system and aimed at Sonic as he said to himself in a cold and nasty manner, "This time, that hedgehog's really cooked... extra well done, that is!"

As Eggman continued to aim at the heroic hedgehog, trying to get a lock on him, a small device was thrown at the gun, which short-circuited after a few seconds upon landing and attaching itself to the weapon.

"What's going on!?" The egg-like human demanded to know, "It won't fire!"

Then, his machine was sent flying into the sky by the strength of Sonic's super, power ring-enhanced speed.

"Gotcha, Eggman!" Sonic grinned, proud of the powerful impact that he did to Eggman's Egg Moible. Then, he ran striaght to another refinery, jumped up and onto the metal structure and flew into the air. Once high enough, Sonic tucked himself into a ball and spun around until he went through the vehicle.

"Curses!" The mad doctor cried out as the second submarine attachment to his personal vehicle was destoryed by Sonic, "This is getting extremely tiresome..."

Then, another idea formed in his brain, causing the egg-like being to grin evilly once more. He chuckled under his breath as he started to convert the idea into a reality.

"Of course, without the refineries to fall back on to enter Metropolis, they'll have to take the main entrance..."

Eggman flew to the city that he had created for his latest mechanical venture, muttering his lasest plan to himself.

Meanwhile, Sonic was in the air, soaring through the sky, like a rocket. However, it was a few seconds before the power ring dissolved from being used, leaving the teenaged hedgehog in a situation that he needed help getting out of and soon!

Luckfully, Ray was in the air when he saw the Blue Blur descend to the Oil Ocean below.

"Here I come, Blue Blur!"

The young squirrel pulled out what looked like a pair of power rings from his shoes. Throwing one of the rings to Sonic, who caught it in a flash.

"Thanks, Ray!" Sonic said as the ring started to glow and act like it was attached to Ray's second ring.

After a small tug from the two rings, Sonic, who swung on the ring as a child would on a playground gym, and Ray returned to their friends and allies. Upon their arrival, they were greeted with great glee.

"Great job, Sonic!" Mary jumped to her friend and hugged him.

"Yeah," Mighty chuckled at the girl's embrace, which caused Sonic to look akward for a moment, "just like before."

"Yeah, but back then," Sonic said after Mary freed him from her grasp, "it was us escaping from an exploding island."

"Big time!" Ray agreed as he recalled the venture with his friends, "I remember that I wanted to swear myself from flying for a few weeks after that."

"I bet the story's a real treat." Tails jumped up as he looked at the two rings that Ray had used to save Sonic from the oily waves, "I would like to know how those rings work too."

"Me too." Mary went to Ray and asked, "May I look at them?"

"Sure." The gold-furred mammal agreed as he passed the rings to the female hedgehog's hands.

Mary accepted the odd rings and examined them carefully. Then, she did something that surprised all of the guys: she managed to separate the rings, and the rings fell off of her hand and dangled in the air, like if they were tied together with a piece of string.

"How did you do that?" Ray asked Mary, who honestly replied, "I have no clue about them. However, I can safely say that you guys can't see what I see, right?"

"Nope." Mighty and Ray said in unison while the other just shook their heads.

"I think I better explain what I mean." Mary announced. Then, she asked Mighty and Ray to help her, which both friends agreed to do, by saying, "Please help me since you two know about the rings better than I do."

"How can we help you out?" Mighty asked the female, who was quick to answer.

"Just grab the rings, and I'll give you the answer."

"Okay..." The armadillo said as he grabbed the two rings and pulled them gently so he would not harm Mary.

As Mighty tugged on the odd rings, Mary saw a small, thin impression mark onto her gloved hand, and Ray saw it as well, becoming very shocked upon seeing it.

"How is this possible!?" The yellow squirrel exclaimed at Mary, who blantly answered, "I don't exactly know the answer myself, but I do have a couple of ideas."

"Well, we can find out later," Ricky spoke out to the others, "back at base."

"Good point." Mary nodded to brown squirrel.

"Let's get going then!" Sonic announced, "We can't let Eggman get us out in the open."

"Especially, since we have four Chaos Emeralds." Tails added to the last statement made by the blue hedgehog.

"I think the number's five." Ricky corrected the vulpine as he pulled out a blue gem, which had a glow.

"It's five." Sonic laughed a bit before he turned to Mary and said, "Are you okay to walk to the base?"

"Of course, I can!" Mary felt offended by the male hedgehog's words before she turned around from the shore and the group before she started to walk away. She only managed to take a few steps before she fell to the ground from exhaustion.

"Mary!" Called out Sonic and Tails as they ran to their friend, while the other three males followed close behind them.

As the hedgehog and fox helped the she-hedgehog to her feet, Mighty was the first to express his own concern for Mary, asking, "Are you okay?"

"I am," Mary said in response to the question, "but I'm not as fine as I thought I was."

The armadillo went to Mary and picked up her, much to the female's annoyance.

"Hey, put me down!"

"Not a chance." Mighty struggled with Mary's scrumming form, "If I let you down, you'll slow all of us down!"

As Mighty continued to try to calm Mary down, Tails turned to Sonic and stated, "I don't know how long the trip's going to be, but I know it's going to feel slow for a while."

"You can say that again." Sonic could not help himself from agreeing with the fox as the six of them headed off to their next location.


	11. Chapter 11

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Eleven<p>

Hours after leaving for the hideout of the fighters of freedom, Mary was in the base and exiting the ladies' shower, wearing a white towel on her head, pink pajamas and matching house slippers. After being covered with crude oil for a while, being cleased of the flith was very welcoming to Mary.

"EXACTLY!" Mary shouted cheerfully, earning a few odd glances from a few people, who was unaware of Mary's earlier episode at the Oil Ocean.

"Oops! Sorry about that!"

Still seeing the stares, the female hedgehog decided to go to her assigned room, which was occupied by someone called Becky.

"Hope she's nice." Mary commented her thoughts to herself as she found her room.

Upon entering the room, she saw a huge brown bear on the desk, wearing a baby blue outfit.

"Hello?" The smaller mammal meeked out as she obtained the larger creature's attenion.

"Why, hi there!" The bear greeted in a sweet tone, much to Mary's relief, "The name's Becky, and you must be my new roomie!"

"Yep." Replied the ex-human in a still nervous smile on her face, "What do you mean by 'new roomie?'"

"Well," Becky started to explain, "my last roomie was captured by the enemy and got converted to their side."

"Oh," Mary said as she translated what Becky was saying; Becky's roommate was turned into a robot, "I'm sorry to hear that."

"Don't worry about that." The bear smiled brightly, "I wasn't expecting myself to be part of a rebellion or anything like that."

Hearing that calmed the young teen, who asked, "Hasn't things been hard for you?"

"Sometimes, yes. On other times, not really." Becky answered the question, "But there are a couple of things I can do without."

"What are you talking about?" Mary asked, but she received her answer in an unfriendly manner.

"Babysitting again, Becky?" A strange voice rang out into the room.

"Get out!" Becky shouted at the trasspasser, which was a certain monkey from Casino Night.

"Just checking on the new girl." The primate said smugly.

Upon seeing him the first time, Mary did not like the monkey, and the second encounter only extended the dislike to a greater height.

"OUT!" Roared the lady bear, who also lacked any love from the intruder.

The sudden shout frightened the rude male enough to flee, slamming the door behind him.

"You've got to know when to use your voice," smiled the blue-claded ursine, whose face changed from a fanged sneer to a bright grin, "if you need it."

Smiling herself, Mary replied, "You've got a point there, Becky."

"Thanks." The bear expressed her pleasure of being complimented. Then, she said, "Nights out. Put the towel in the hamper and get some sleep."

"I will." Mary replied, nodded her head in the process.

"Good," smiled the brown bear before she returned to the desk and her work, "lights out's coming fast."

Mary took the towel and put it on the over-filled hamper and quickly went to the bunk beds.

"The bottom's mine." Becky spoke without turning around to the hedgehog.

"Thanks." The yellow mammal responded to her brown roommate before she climbed to the top.

As she tucked herself into the covers, Mary noticed that some parts of the base was under the ground. The dirt really have an odd sense of coziness to her, which she believed that was because she was a hedgehog in that world.

"Hey, new girl!" Becky shouted to her, pulling Mary from her thoughts, "What's your name?"

"It's Mary Allenson."

With that statement coming from the hedgehog's mouth by the bear's ears perked interest. With one moment, Becky flew up from her chair and desk, and she went to Mary, who was surprised by the bear's sudden appearance at her side.

"You're the one that saved Ricky from the refineries' owner."

"Yeah." The ex-human made no attempt to deny the statement, "It's no big deal to me, so why should it be one to you?"

"No big deal!?" Becky exclaimed in her hyperactive shock, "You'te the Mage from the stories!"

"I still don't see what's the big deal." Mary confessed her lack of interest, "I'm just tried now."

Exclaiming her disbelief, the blue and brown bear said in response, "Are you nuts? The Mage isn't interested in the power that her and the Warrior are supposed to rediscover and reintrodue to the world?!"

"Not right now." Mary added to her confession, "Sleep is in my interest list and at the top. Good night."

Defeated, Becky gave up and returned to her desk, which allowed Mary Allenson to get some sleep from the tiring day.

* * *

><p>Later in the following morning, Mary was dressed in her green jacket attire that she wore after the situation in the Chemial Factory and made her way to Sonic's and Tails's sides.<p>

"Good morning!" The yellow hedgehog greeted her firends in a refreshed tone of voice.

"Same to you." Sonic showed a brotherly smile to Mary, while Tails said, "You look better than you did yesterday."

"Yeah." Mary looked up for a moment as an expression of her way of saying, 'No kidding.'

"Figures that a shower and a good night's sleep would do wonoders for a girl!" Becky's voice echoed from behind the yellow, female mammal.

"Good morning, Becky." Groaned Mary as the brown bear entered her sights, "How was your night?"

The yellow hedgehog was doing well of hiding her dismay from the large ursine, who replied in a cheerful tone, "I'm doing great, but I would have had a better night if someone wasn't so snobby."

"Try 'tried,'" Mary was quick to correct the bear, "I had a long day yesterday, and I wasn't in the mood to talk about anything."

"But you would sleep?" Becky was quick to add a weak comeback.

"Becky!" Ricky spoke up to help Mary out of a sticky situation with the bear, "She's been fighting Doctor Eggman like everyone else around here. So, back off of her."

The baby blue attired bear was soundly defeated again and retreated to another part of the base, leaving the four to talk among themselves.

"Thank you for the save, Ricky." Smiled the yellow hedgehog as the brown squirrel returned the graditude.

"Not a problem, Miss Mary." Ricky learned that Mary was the Mage of the stories of his home land and started to use the honoric name towards the young female, "I'm just glad that you were nearby to help me in my time of need."

"Keep up with the 'miss' bit, and people will start to talk." Sonic spoke out, grabbing the rebel founder's and Mary's attentions.

"Keep up the green look, Sonic," Ricky made his counter to the hedgehog's statement, "and people are sure to talk about you and Mary."

Tails looked at Mary and asked her, "What are they talking about?"

"Don't have a clue." Mary announced, not sure what both males were talking about, which was her.

"Besides," Ricky turned around to Mary, "we have business to talk about in the conference room."

"Good!" Mary smiled as she expressed her eagerness to the co-founder, "Soinc, Tails and I will be there!"

"One problem: I must ask just you to come. Sonic and Tails were fighting Eggman to protect themselves." The squirrel said half-thoughtfully, which earned him Mary's complete dismissal to him.

"Forget it! I'm not going!"

"What?" The actions of the three males was evident on their faces.

"I'M... NOT... GOING!" Mary's voice was strong and unyielding to anything, "If it wasn't for Sonic and Tails, I'd wouldn't be here, maybe dead. Besides that, Sonic's dad and uncle had fought many times in the past, and the Prower clan's had been by the hedgehog's side to stop Eggman's attempt's to enslave the world. Now, tell me agian that my friends can't come."

This time, Ricky Oak was defeated by a female hedgehog, who was also the Mage from the stories of his family and many other families like his. Becky also lost, but Ricky was willing to admit defeat.

"You've got a very good set of points when it came to your friends. Sorry about that."

Mary was still a little upset, but she was really to respond to the bushy-tailed rodent.

"It's alright."

* * *

><p>At the meeting, Mary with Sonic and Tails were sitting next to Mighty, Ray and Ricky, who was talking about how the rebels next course of action against the dictator that was Doctor Ivo Robotnik.<p>

"So, the Oil Ocean's out of the equation." The statement was disheartening to most of the members of the meeting, and Ricky asked, "So, does anyone have an idea?"

"Frontal assault!" A duet rang out, causing the others at the meeting to look at the monkey and the eagle.

"Okay," the brown squirrel tried to ignore the duo's answer, "anyone else?"

The only thing that answered Ricky Oak was nearly complete silence, which he was not liking at all. So, he asked once more.

"Don't be shy, everyone. I'm open to suggustions. Anyone?"

As expected from everyone in the room, no one was going to give their answer, at first.

"Excuse me." Tails raised his hand to speak, which Ricky allowed with a nod, "is there another way into Metorpolis?"

"Dummy!" Hollered the monkey, "There's no other way!"

As the eagle with the lavender ascot laughed with the monkey, a rage boiled up inside Mary, who wished not to disrupt the conference yet wanted to yell at the immature duo. Fortunately, someone else was willing to halt the meeting to stand up for Tails.

"Knock it off!" Mighty stood up to the cruel duo, "Tails has been helping Sonic and Mary make their way to stop Eggman, and what have you two been doing: goofing around and messing with every person that crosses your path! Now, am I right, or am I wrong?"

Perfectly surprised and extremely embarrassed, the vest-wearing monkey and the ascot-wearing eagle backed to their seats as the black and red armadillo continued to lecture them.

"And you call yourselves fighter for freedom. Lame!"

"Pathetic..." Mary muttered under her breath, which the blue hedgehog and the two-tailed fox heard her.

Tails was a little overwhelmed about the two bullies making fun of him, as if Eggman was not trying to control the island, but he was grateful that someone was standing up for him. However, he was surprised that it was not Sonic or Mary, whom he saw much restraint on the yellow hedgehog's part, that did the job.

The male hedgehog was truly upset at the duo's unwanted words, but he knew that those who spoke too much were the ones who would suffer greatly at another time. However, Mary's muttering word was a bit of a shock to him.

"Now," Ricky spoke once again as the plated mammal returned to his seat, "we need a real plan. So, who's got one?"

Making plans was not one of Sonic's strongest assets, but one did form in his mind.

"I think I've got one."

Sonic's sudden announcement shocked everyone in the room, like a small wave. Soon, the Blue Blur was the subject of the meeting's attention.

"What is it?" Ray looked at his old friend with a hopeful expression on his face, which Sonic took as a sign of confidence and spoke his mind.

"Well, it's going to be a little sneaky, but that's going to require a big distraction, which is were the duo's idea comes in."

"Yes!" The two friends said to each other in an excited tone of voice.

"But you two get to help distracting the robots." Sonic added, deflating the feeling of excitement in the pair, who were feeling a little worried about themselves by that time.

Seeing the faces of those who tormented him because of his intelligence made Tails smile, happy that Sonic was not going to allow them to evade anything that is their duty, whether or not they liked it.

"Alright then," Sonic spoke out to his allies, "Here's what we're going to do..."

In a moment, the entire meeting was paying attention to Sonic's plan to invade Metropolis.


	12. Chapter 12

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Twelve<p>

In the following afternoon, the robotic guards traced their programmed paths at the entrance of Metorpolis. Tirelessly and unyielding, the machines marched with clockwork timing.

Then, a missile seemingly flew from the horizon that was opposite of the entrance and impacted onto the gated entry of the robotic city. This attack caused the robots to ready themselves for battle, but it was late when Sonic and Mighty, in ball-like forms, charged at the robots, freeing each of the trapped animal in each robot.

"Man," the armadillo exclaimed once in his normal form, "that was easy."

"Yeah..." Sonic said as his green eyes scanned the newly-destoryed entrance, "It's too easy."

Then, lasers flew at the duo, causing the friends to dodge the harmful beams.

"Let's get them!" Sonic the hedgehog winked at his ally, which Mighty returned as he said, "Right, Sonic."

As Sonic and Mighty attacked the laser-wielding machines, two certain members of the Fighters for Freedom appeared from seemingly nowhere and shouted, "Frontal assault!"

On a cue, the rest of the freedom fighters rose from their hiding places, and they charged after any robots that stood in their way.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Ray and Tails were flying through the skies of West Side Island on a part of the plan that Sonic formed and explained in the meeting. The squirrel was doing well in the jounrey, while Tails was trying to keep up, but he was getting tried.<p>

"Come on, Tails!" Ray called to the Prower child, "We're almost there!"

"I'm trying!" The fox screamed out to the squirrel, trying to keep up.

Ray turned his head to the fox that was falling behind and noticed that the youngest member of the Prower family was slowly and surely descending to the earth below them. On a guess, the yellow squirrel turned back and allowed Tails to hover onto his back.

"Thanks, Ray..." An exhausted Tails said before he fell into a slumber.

"Not a problem." The flying squirrel replied as he carried the fox to their destination.

* * *

><p>Back in Metorpolis, Sonic, Mighty and the rest of the Fighters For Freedom were doing battle with Eggman's robotized fighters. Some of the organic combatants were harmed, and a strong number of the enslaved creatures were freed, allowing them to either escape or join the battle. Within thirty mintues of the fight, the side that fought for the freedom of West Side Island was winning.<p>

"This is supposed to be when Mary drops by." Mighty looked at Sonic, who said, "She'll be here."

Then, Mary appeared, as if on cue, but she was covered with dirt and slight brusing, which brought concern to the male hedgehog.

"Whoa, what happened to you?!"

"Yeah," Mighty agreed, and he was just as shocked as his old friend upon seeing the female hedgehog, "you looked like you've been ambushed, Mary!"

"That's because I was." Mary managed to say to her male allies, "Apparently, Eggman saw that tonight was the night to attack the base. I've managed to escaped from attackers with the Chaos Emeralds."

"And the others?" The black, red and yellow armadillo asked, worried about the others that were left behind in the invaded base.

"I'm sorry, Mighty." Mary's blue eyes watered from the tears forming in them, "There's nothing I could have done."

"Don't worry about it, Mary." The armadillo patted the girl on the back in an attempt to comfort her, "You did what you thought was right."

A weak smile formed on the yellow hedgehog's face, showing her guilt immensely.

"Don't worry." Sonic took a turned to calm the poor girl, "The sooner we can reach the Egg Capsule, the sooner we can help those back at the base. Okay?"

Grateful and eased by her friends' words, Mary regained her courage and placed on a brave face as she spoke to her friends.

"Thanks, guys. I really needed the pep talk."

Then, a robot charged at the trio, who fought back and defeated the machine and freeing the animal that was trapped inside.

"Let's get going!" Sonic announced to his two main allies in the robotic city, "Waiting around here's not going to do us any good."

"Right!" Mighty and Mary nodded, both knowing that Sonic was correct.

Then, the trio started to make their way into the inner parts of the metal Metropolis. Facing the city's many dangers, like the explosive starfish that was called the Asteron, the offensively repeating crab-bot, Shellcracker, and the Slicer, the mantis-like Badnik with boomerang-like pincers, the trio went through turquoise caves made of steel, rode wide screws and bolts that reached to the higher parts of the city, and evaded giant mesh-work dynamos that push out hundreds of revolutions per minute and pools of molten metal, which helped the city maintain some of its power. Sonic rode on some of the boa-like steam-pipes and pull Mary and Mighty along with the use of the odd power rings, which the girl learned were called link rings.

Finally, the three mammals reached the heart of the city, which was a huge control room, and in the middle of the room was the yellow Chaos Emerald in the metal pedestal with a glass cover over it.

"That's it!" Mary smiled as she cheered at her team's apparent victory, "Just one more to go!"

"Right," Sonic agreed with the female hedgehog before turning to the armadillo and said, "Mighty, do your stuff."

"You've got it, Sonic."

The shelled creature brought his fingers together and stretched out his arm, making a ghastly chorus of pops and cracks from his fingers. He freed his fingers from each other and shook them as he approached the glass case that protected the Chaos Emerald. With a clenched fist, Mighty lived up to his name by smashing the glass, which allowed the trio to retrieve the powerful gem.

"Perfect!" Sonic said, giving the powerful armadillo a thumbs up, "That was cool!"

"Thanks." Mighty replied in a proud manner, "I've been working out since that mess we've gotten into the last time."

Mary made her way to the Chaos Emerald, removed it from its seat in the center of the mechanic city that was Metropolis and put it with its fellow Chaos Emeralds. After this, the yellow hedgehog made a very quick announcement to the males of the trio.

"We better start looking for the Egg Capsule."

"Right!" Mighty and Sonic agreed with a movement of their heads.

Then, the trio ran off to another part of the heart of the city and found the device and deactivated it.

"That's the end of that!" Mighty smugly annouunced, which earned the doubt of the hedgehogs.

"No, it's not." Mary shook her head to the armadillo.

"Come on, Mary." The confident armadillo responded to the female hedgehog.

"Mary's right," Sonic spoke out, "Eggman's probably got something cooking for us."

"How right you are, Sonic!" The voice of Dr. Eggman rang out to the trio.

The three mammals looked around for the source of the voice.

"Where are you, Egg Gut!?" Mighty shouted out to the voice.

"Look!" Mary shouted at the sight of the Eggmoible and the mad man.

"There!" Sonic shouted, also seeing Eggman, but at another part of the area.

"He's there!" The armadillo pointed at the direction of where he saw the doctor.

Then, a thought entered Mary's mind.

"He's everywhere!"

"Now, someone's got an idea!" The mad man's voice rang out from everywhere.

Then, the three Eggmen were joined by four more, and the three mammals saw that they were in for a fight.

"Seven Eggmen against the three of us..." Sonic spoke out to his allies, "Not what I call the best odds."

"Agreed." Mary nodded, "But maybe if we hit the right one, we'll stop them."

"You think that's gonna work?" Mighty asked Mary, who replied, "You've got any ideas?"

"Good point." The armadillo commented.

"Then, we've got a plan!" Sonic grinned at his friends.

First, Sonic jumped into the air and hit one of the Eggmen, which was a balloon of the Eggmobile and the doctor. Seeing this, the armadillo could not stop himself from feeling a little silly about his choose of words towards the girl.

"Looks like you're right, Mary."

Then, another Eggman flew at Mighty and Mary, who evaded the attack. The plated mammal retaliated by attacking the Eggman, revealing that one was another balloon.

"Where's a needle when you need one?" Mary asked in a comic manner when another 'Eggman' dove at her.

Then, she remembered that her spikes would be perfect for popping the fake Eggmen, and she tested the theory by curling herself into a ball and jumping onto the balloon.

"Three down, four to go!" The female hedgehog shouted as she turned to her teammates.

"That's right!" Mighty agreed as the fourth 'Eggman' flew by and nearly harmed him, "Let's hope that we find the real Eggman soon!"

"Yeah!" The blue blur shouted before he jumped onto the 'Eggman' and destorying it.

The fifth 'Eggman' met its fate in the hands of Mighty, who just punched it.

"Whoa!" Mary gasped out as she popped the sixth balloon with her hedgehog spines.

The seventh Eggman look-a-like flew around with increased speed, making it difficult for any of the trio to even get the balloon.

"Man, Eggman's really getting cocky about his so-called genius." Mighty asked in his annoyance as he tired to destory the balloon.

"No kidding!" Mary sharply agreed with Mighty.

"Oh, man..." The blue hedgehog groaned, not knowing what to do about the final 'Eggman.'

Then, the trio found themselves back-to-back to each other.

"What's the plan now?" Mighty asked the hedgehogs in the hopes that one of them would own.

"It's still in the works." Mary said, not wanting to be blunt about not knowing what to do.

Then, the oddest thing happened: the balloon that was the seventh 'Eggman' slowed down and came to a complete stop, deflated by a hole that was in the balloon. This occurance puzzled the hedgehogs and the armadillo.

"Okay," Mighty spoke out of his confusion, "what's going on now?"

Then, a metal claw appeared out of nowhere and grabbed Mary. She screamed when the claw caught her, but at any octave, the males would have heard her and turned to see the capture take place.

"Mary!" Sonic and Mighty shouted to their female ally as they saw the she-hedgehog's captor: Dr. Eggman.

"So, how did you boys enjoy the game?" The doctor bluntly asked as he allowed a smug smile to appeared on his face.

"Dammit, Eggman!" Mighty cursed at the old man, "Let go of her!"

"That's not I'm going to do." The doctor said before he flew off with Mary as his captive.

Mary's friends raced after her and Eggman in an attempt to rescue the captured member of the group. Sonic ran, while Mighty used the link rings to keep up with the speedy mammal.

However, their efforts were in vain, as Eggman flew higher into the air, taking Mary with him.

"Soinc," Mighty spoke to the spine-covered mammal, "we can't keep up with him!"

"We've got to try!" Replied the blue hedgehog as he continued his chase.

Then, a rumble roared from the ground, stopping the hedgehog in his chase.

"What's going on?" Mighty asked, confused about the events that was happening.

The armadillo recieved his answer, when the metal ground became two pieces and withdrew from each other. The opening revealed a huge fortress, which flew almost as quickly as the ground opened. The sudden event grabbed everyone's attention, including Sonic and Mighty.

"That's not good!" Mighty announced, and the statement was something that Sonic hated, but he could not help himself from agreeing with it.

Things were looking dim for Mary and maybe the rest of the world.


	13. Chapter 13

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Thirteen<p>

In a closing distance from Metropolis and the flying beige fortress, Ray flew the _Tornado_ towards the area, while Tails, who was awake by that time, rode in the extra seat.

"Wow!" The young fox exclaimed in a mixture of awe and fright, "That thing's colossal!"

"Yeah," the flying squirrel agreed as the sight entered his view, "that looks like our next stop, but we've got to pick someone up from Eggman's base!"

"Who?" Tails asked the older rodent, who just replied, "You'll see soon enough!"

The squirrel, when he was close enough to the robotic city, sent the plane into a nosedive, scaring Tails to the point that the fox flew a curse out of his mouth. Ray knew what he was doing, but Tails lacked that knowledge and became grateful to the pilot when Ray managed to keep the aircraft from crashing by straightening it.

Seeing this skill of maneuvering the _Tornado_, Sonic and Mighty saw the only way to reach Eggman's new hideout and rescuing Mary. The hedgehog turned to the armadillo and asked a question.

"Ready, Mighty?"

"As I'll ever be, Sonic."

With a grin, Sonic ran from Mighty to a few yards from the armadillo, made a very wide U-turn and ran towards Mighty! However, the armadillo was not scared and readied himself for his part of the idea that he shared with Sonic. Mighty cracked the knuckles in his right hand and planted his footing on the ground, and when Sonic jumped into the air, the black and red armadillo threw a powerful punch that connected to Sonic's shoe.

The impact was so powerful that sent Sonic into the air. Luckfully for the blue hedgehog, he landed onto the top set of the bi-plane's wings.

Seeing this, Mighty, who was sent back a few feet from the impact, looked at the passing _Tornado_ and spoke to Sonic, knowing that the hedgehog could not hear him, "Good luck, pal."

* * *

><p>On the airplane, Sonic looked at flying duo and gave them a thumbs-up, which Ray and Tails each replied with one of their own.<p>

Soaring through the air and chasing after the fortress, the flying trio encountered badniks that looked like a cross-over of fighter jet and a red hawk, which were called Balkiry, and Sonic dispatched the speedy badniks with ease. The flying egg-shaped badniks, Nebula, kept dropping spiked balls at the _Tornado_, which made things hard for Ray to control the plane and Sonic from falling off. The Turtloids were troublesome for the trio, but Sonic managed to knock off the controlling turtle-robot, which made the bigger turtle-robot harmless. With each destoryed robot, a bird was freed, which pleased Tails greatly.

Then, the _Tornado_ finally reached the flying fortress, and the achievement was more than enough to cause Sonic, Ray and Tails to cheer.

"We've made it!" Tails shouted happily to his allies.

"Heh, that's good!" Ray agreed and matched with the young vulpine's excitement.

Sonic, however, was not so jubilant as his younger friends; Mary was still Dr. Eggman's prisoner, and Sonic felt like it was his fault that she was in that situation.

Then, laser beams flew at the aircraft, nearly hitting it. Sonic held on to the wings, while Ray managed to keep the plane from being hit.

"Sonic, it looks like you get off here!" Ray shouted out to the hedgehog, who knew that the golden squirrel was right.

With a powerful leap, the azure mammal went from his family's airplane and onto Eggman's flying fortress, leaving Ray and Tails to back off from the fortress's defenses.

"Hold on a little longer, Mary." Sonic said before embarking on his journey, "I'm coming."

* * *

><p>Mary opened her eyes to find herself tied up by a rope and in a seat. Dazed and confused, the yellow hedgehog traced back what happened to her, once she was composed enough to stop slurring her words.<p>

"Okay... I was captured by Eggman, brought to his fortress, cussed him out, and then... he gassed me. Man, that stinks."

Then, she looked at her surroundings, which reminded her of a spaceship's interior. Mary also saw a seat that was near her own, which told Mary that it was Eggman's, if he was the pilot, seat, and near the chair was her turquoise backpack with the cyan Chaos Emerald poking out of it. This brought some questions into her mind: What is Eggman's plan? Did he have the seventh Emerald? Will Sonic save her and the world again?

In a moment's passing, an idea formed in Mary's head, and it was going to be loud...

Taking a deep breath, the yellow hedgehog said, "One..." and breathed out, "for the money."

Repeating the breath for a second time, Mary said in an inhale, "Two..." and exhaled, "for the show."

For a third time, she breathed in deeply and exhaled loudly, "Three to get ready."

For the fourth time, Mary breathed in and said the last part at the same time, "And four to go..."

The female hedgehog held her breath after the ending, but that was only for a second. Opening her mouth, a loud yell rang out of her mouth as she called out for her dearest friend in an attempt to get him to find her.

"SONNNNNIIIIIC!"

The shout echoed throughout the airborne base, grabbing everyone's attention, including a certain blue hedgehog, who halted in his dash.

"Mary..." Sonic smiled in relief, happy that Mary's still alive. Then, a cocky smile formed in the relieved smile's place as he said, "Looks like I don't have to worry about these Cluckers too much."

Resuming his run, he followed the direction of the yell, while dodging the attacks of the chicken-like robots that he had spoke of earlier and the other hazards of the beige craft. Soon, the blue blur reached a part of the base that he knew Eggman was.

"Well, Sonic," the doctor spoke with a dark grin under his facial hair, "you've actually made it this far. I have to admit that I'm quite impressed."

"Don't flatter too much, Eggman." The blue hedgehog was in no mood to be complimented by his family's foe, but he maintained his confident smile, "I'm here to stop you and get back Mary and the Chaos Emeralds."

"I don't think so, hedgehog." The mad man said as he pressed a button on the control panel that was next to him.

Sonic tried to go after Eggman, but a barrier suddenly appeared, which stopped the teenaged mammal in his tracks. The hedgehog looked behind him and saw that another barrier was formed at the entrance of the area. Cursing under his breath, Sonic turned his attention back to Eggman, who was talking in a gloating manner at this time.

"You see, Sonic, I've been doing some research about the Chaos Emeralds and the legends that revolve around them, including the foresight of the warrior and the mage. The residents of West Side Island say that these two beings would come and rediscover the power that threatened the island long ago. I see by my research that the seven Chaos Emeralds possess that very power. However, I never took much stock in believing that another being could the capability to control, at least, a portion of that power."

"What changed your mind then?" Sonic asked, expressing his impatience by tapping his foot.

"Try 'who,' Sonic." Eggman hinted darkly, "After all, we've both met her about a month ago."

The hint was more than enough to make Sonic realize what the doctor was talking about.

"Mary?"

"That's right." Eggman gloated nastily, "She possesses the power of Chaos Control, something my grandfather had researched sometime before his death."

"I know she won't work for you!" Sonic announced, fearing that Eggman would use Mary to get what the mad man wanted.

"Maybe not," the old man scoffed at Sonic as he pressed another button, "but I would concerned about escaping that barrier, if I were you."

Then, a bright beam appeared from the ceiling, grabbing Sonic's attention. Something told the hedgehog that he better think of an idea quickly, before the laser had a chance to harm him.

"Nowhere to run to, hedgehog." Eggman started to boast, seeing victory within his reach.

Sonic could see that the egg-shaped human was right, but he could see that the doctor was also foolish. Pulling out the linking rings, Sonic threw one of the rings to the base of the laser, which was at the ceiling. Then, the blue hedgehog boldly ran into the barrier, which bounced Sonic into the air.

"What's this!?" The mad doctor shouted as he watched Sonic curl into a spiky ball and sliced through his laser beam. Upon seeing his device destoryed, Eggman shouted in a childish rant, "You may have freed yourself, but I've yet to begun to fight!"

With that, Eggman ran off, and Sonic would have chased after him, but the barrier that protected Eggman's side of the area was still active.

"I better go the other way." The hedgehog said before running off.

* * *

><p>Flying near the beige base without being attacked, Ray and Tails saw that some of the fortress's machinery starting to shut down. This was confusing at first, but they realized that they could get close enough without being shot at by the defenses.<p>

"Let's go!" Ray shouted as he aimed the _Tornado_ to the fortress's side.

As the bi-plane flew close by, Tails was the first to spot Sonic, saying, "There he is!"

Taking notice of both the announcement and the blue hedgehog, the flying squirrel drove the plane close enough to allow Sonic to hop onto the top set of wings once again without crashing the smaller aircraft into the flying base.

"Let's go!" The hedgehog shouted to Ray, who was about to ask why, but the squirrel's answer came faster than his question.

A slim, in comparison with the flying fortress, rocket launched from the beige base, and in the cockpit was Doctor Eggman.

Seeing this and knowing that Eggman must be up to something, Ray pressed a red button. Upon the pressing of that certain button, a hatch opened under the _Tornado_, which allowed a small rocket engine to be used without burning the plane. Then, the engine fired up, causing the swift _Tornado_ to go even faster.

"We've got to reach that rocket before the afterburners start!" Tails shouted to the older allies.

"The _Tornado's_ got only one rocket engine!" Ray shouted back, "This is as fast as we can go!"

Then, Sonic jumped off the plane, sending a jolt of shock to the duo that were seated in the plane.

"Sonic!" Ray and Tails cried out to the hedgehog, but their combined plea fell onto deaf ears as they watch the azure mammal latch himself to the rocket, just as the afterburners revved up. The only thing that Sonic's flying friends could do was watch the rocket blast off and taking Sonic with it.

* * *

><p>Mighty watched the rocket's depature from the flying fortress from the ground with Ricky, Becky and the majority of the Fighters for Freedom. The red armadillo noticed something in the air that was red, and he knew that it was the <em>Tornado<em>. He started off after the bi-plane, not noticing that Ricky saw the red speck in the sky and tried to ask the armadillo a question.

"Hey, Mi-? HEY!"

The brown squirrel chased after the red armadillo until Mighty saw the _Tornado_ came by and land a few yards from the running twosome.

"RAY!" Mighty shouted out, trying to be heard over the roar of the quieting engine, which was still very loud.

The flying squirrel did not respond to the question until the engine turned off and exited the plane.

"Hi, Mighty. What's up?"

"That's what I was going to ask you." The armadillo responded to his life-long friend.

"Well," the gold-shaded rodent replied, "Sonic's after Eggman and now on his way to outer space!"

"Great!" Mighty smiled. Then, his face saddened when he noticed something, which caused him to ask, "Where's Mary?"

"I thought she was with you." Tails hopped out of the bi-plane.

Realizing what was going on, Mighty announced, "Didn't Sonic tell you two? Mary's been captured by Eggman!"

This news shocked Ray, Tails and Ricky.

"How did this happen?" Ricky turned Mighty around and faced the armadillo.

"I don't know!" Mighty defended himself, "Sonic, Mary and I were fighting off Eggman and his copies, and then he swooped down, used a cane and grabbed Mary, like a prize in a game machine!"

"So, that's Sonic seemed distracted." Ray thought out loud.

"But Sonic can rescue her," Tails bursted out his belief before he allowed his doubt to be revealed by asking, "right?"

"I don't know." The armadillo became somber in the realization that he seemed to have.

"What do you mean?" Ricky spoke up, but his answer came from his cousin.

"Well, Sonic's always had a strong advantage on the ground, even if he was halted by water. However, in outer space, he might have a problem, since he's never been up there before."

This realization caused the four to become very worried about the heroic hegdehog and his efforts to rescue their friend Mary.


	14. Chapter 14

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Fourteen<p>

The rocket, after a time of flying from the Flying Fortess, landing into a space station that was in the planet's orbit, and hanging on for dear life and the ride was Sonic, who was still determinded to safe his friend. Mary, who was a hostage of the mad man, was also along for the ride, but it was not of her own free will.

At this point, Eggman was quick with his actions as he straped his prisoner to an unknown part of the station.

The coblat hedgehog saw this and shouted out to the female hedgehog.

"Mary!"

The doctor had climbed into his personal aircraft by that time, and upon hearing the shouted from the blue hedgehog, he pressed a button that send the girl away. Then, he turned to Sonic and said, "You won't be seeing her again."

Sonic went after the mad human, who fled on his flying craft into the inside of the station. Soon, the hedgehog lost sight of the doctor, which annoyed Sonic greatly.

_"And here we are again."_ Eggman's voice rang out to Sonic's pointed ears, _"I've got something to show you."_

Then, a silver, metal hedgehog fell out of the ceiling and landing near where Sonic stood. From the first look, the teenaged mammal knew that it was not an ally.

_"Meet Mecha Sonic." _The voice of the human continued to echo out, _"He'll be the one to prove that I am the victroious one this time!"_

"That's what you think, Eggman!" Sonic shouted out, nearly ignoring the robotic fake.

Mecha Sonic's eyes glowed red via activation and curled into a ball.

"What?!" The male hedgehog noticed the eyes of the fake Sonic before it started its attack.

The blue hedgehog jumped over the slightly taller fraud, and Sonic saw something shining in the inside of the robot, which told the teen that he had to do something to stop the robot.

_"What's the matter, Sonic?" _Eggman mocked from his hiding place, _"Worried that Mecha Sonic's going to beat you up?"_

The young mammal ignored the mad man's statement and waited for his chance to defeat the robotic look-a-like, which started to charge at him with rocket boosters.

Then, an idea appeared in the teenager's mind, but he needed to time it just right. Mecha Sonic curled into a ball of metal once again and charged at Sonic for third time, and that time the robot bounced into the air, which Sonic was expecting, but not that soon. However, he knew that there was no time for regrets.

As quick as he could, Sonic curled into a spiny ball, charged at Mecha Sonic and hit it, which caused the robot to crash into a wall that broke apart like a window or a glass-like substance.

"Talk about your break-away walls." Sonic grinned as the robot, completely damaged, tried to confront Sonic again, but it only fell to pieces and revealing its power source: the final Chaos Emerald.

Grabbing the powerful gem, Sonic looked around until he saw Dr. Eggman retreating to a deeper part of the space station. Giving chase, the blue mammal pursued the older human, who managed to disappear from Sonic's sights. The teen skidded to a stop, looked around for a moment, ignoring the beautiful sight of his home planet and called out to the mad man.

"Eggman, where are you?"

Then, the floor started shaking under Sonic's feet, and the rumbling was followed by dramatic appearence of a mechanically being, which resembled Doctor Eggman very strongly

_"Here I am!" _Boasted the hidden human being as his voice echoed from the robot, _"Inside my Death Egg Robot!"_

Sonic was about to charge at the robot, hoping to make quick work of the robotic look-a-like of Doctor Ivo Robotnik, when the chest opened to reveal something that halted Sonic's attack: a constrained hedgehog of bright yellow fur.

"Mary!" The young hero shouted out, which was followed by a mocking laugh of the mad doctor.

_"That's right, Sonic, I've got your little friend."_

Torn between attaking his enemy to stop the mad plan and harming his friend in the process, the teenage hedgehog did not want to do in terms of action, but he did know what to say to the deiranged doctor.

"This is low, even for you!"

_"Sticks and stones."_ The doctor's voice taunted Sonic.

The hedgehog looked at his imprisoned friend, who was struggling to free herself from the metal strips. Then, he realized that the female hedgehog was trying to reach a certain direction. Seeing this, Sonic knew what he had to do.

_"There's nothing you can do, you blue fool!"_ Eggman mocked the teenaged hedgehog once more, but this time, Sonic had a retrot to the egg-shaped man.

"Yes, there is!"

Hearing the doctor's frustated growl through the microphone, Sonic ran off when the giant mech shot its arms, which had spikes on the 'hands,' at him. The blue hedgehog was lucky that the arms had a limited reach, causing the robot to pull the arms back. Seeing a chance, the colbat teen spun and charged at the robot's chest.

Meanwhile, Mary wiggled and struggled to free herself, but to no avail. However, Sonic's attack broke through the glass-appearing barrier and hit the restraits. The male hedgehog's charge had successfully freed the ex-human from Eggman.

"Thanks, Sonic." Mary smiled in her relief and sudden freedom.

"Good to heard." Sonic responded quickly, and he maintained the speed as he added, "You better look for the Chaos Emeralds, while I take care of Eggman."

"Okay." Nodded the female of the duo before Sonic departed from the opening that he created. Once Sonic was out, Mary started her search for the six Chaos Emeralds.

Sonic landed in front of the Death Egg Robot and into Eggman's sights.

_"There you are!"_ The operator of the machine shouted out before going after Sonic, who started to dodge the stomping legs.

As Sonic distracted Eggman, Mary explored the inside of the robot with some form of difficultly due to the parts of the Death Egg Robot that she was in were not designed to be used as a corridor of any kind. Being careful not to harm herself by falling onto the wiring and rotating gears, especially where the robot jumped into the air to crush the blue hedgehog's body, the yellow hedgehog looked for the six powerful jewels that were taken from her by the man that was called Ivo Robotnik.

By the time Mary found the area that was using the Chaos Emeralds for power, Doctor Eggman was becoming irked by Sonic's evading movements and taunting gestures. In a moment of insane fury, Eggman started firing rockets at the hedgehog, unknowingly and uncaringly destorying the Death Egg Space Station.

"Sonic!" Mary gasped upon hearing the sounds of the rockets being fired, believing accurately that the projectiles were aimed at Sonic.

Acting quickly, the ex-human rushed at the six gems that was powering the huge machine, not concerned about the consequences of her rushed actions as she grabbed for the cyan emerald...

Sonic managed to evade being hit by the destructive projectiles, but he was starting to feel a little discouraged about his chances of surviving the aftermath of the battle.

_"Looks like you're running out of room to run, Sonic."_

Hearing the taunting doctor's voice, Sonic knew that he needed a miracle to get himself and Mary out of the mess that the Death Egg Robot had made.

Then, the chest exploded, surprising both Sonic and Eggman.

_"What's going on!?" _The human demanded an explaination for the implosion in his machine

"Mary!" Sonic shouted as he saw the form in the clearing smoke.

Making a powerful leap to the hole in the robot's chest, the teenaged hedgehog saw Mary, who was injured, covered with brusies and dust and holding the six Chaos Emeralds that was in the robot.

"Mary," the blue hedgehog asked as he neared the female, who opened an eye upon hearing Sonic's worried voice.

"Looks like I wasn't using my head when I grabbed for the Emeralds, huh?"

"Mary..." Sonic sighed, relieved and happy that Mary was all right.

The moment of the reunion was interrupted by a blaring alarm and a frantic voice of Doctor Eggman.

_"What! The robot's out of my control now!"_

To some, this would be good news, but due to the fact that both the hedgehogs and the human were in outer space, it was a fatal event to be in at any rate.

However, Doctor Eggman had probably forseen the possiblity that Sonic and Mary, if not anyone else, stopping his plans for world domination. The doctor fled the breaking mech to the spacecraft that he had used to escape Sonic the first time. Making no time to stop, he deported himself for the station and back to his home planet.

Being left behind was not a concern to Sonic, since he did not know of Doctor Eggman's departure. The blue hedgehog was trying to help his injuried friend to a possible escape route, however when he reached the docking area, Sonic's heart sank due to the fleeing spacecraft.

Mary saw this, and she weakly turned her head to the azure hedgehog and asked, "Sonic, please give me my Chaos Emerald."

The request may sounded simple, but Sonic knew that Mary was going to attempt to use her power to get them out of the station, which had started to explode and an alarm announced the incoming destruction of the space station.

_"Alert! The Death Egg will self-destruct in five mintues!"_

"There'sno way to get out of here!" Sonic hissed out of his mouth, however Mary was quick to speak to her dearest friend.

"Sonic, we're going to out of this mess."

"How?" The male hedgehog asked, questioning the female's statement, "We're trapped in outer space!"

"Easy." Mary smiled weakly, "I'm going teach you about how I was able to use Chaos Control."

* * *

><p>Back at West Side Island, Tails was looking up at the sky, looking for any sign of the two hedgehogs that he befriended over the course of a few days. Since his discovery of Mary's kidnapping and Sonic's pursuit after her, he sat on the wing of the <em>Tornado<em>, waiting for their return.

"Man..." The fox sighed, feeling sad about not knowing what had happened to his new friends.

Then, a bright light broke out in the mid-morning sky, grabbing his attention as well as everyone else on the island.

"It's got to be them!" Tails shouted before climbing into the pilot's seat.

Starting up the plane, the two-tailed fox took off in search of the two friends that he had been worrying about since the day before.

"Guys! Where are you?!" Tails yelled out in the blue sky, hoping for an answer, either by voice and/or sign.

Continuing his search, the young friend of the hedgehogs was starting to feel very helpless and depressed, and this caused his to start losing some of the hope that he had before the light's sudden appearance.

Then, a small speck of yellow entered his sights, causing his hope to recover in his young heart.

"Mary!"

The _Tornado_ was pushed toward the bright dot, which was falling towards the planet's surface. Tails maneuvered the bi-plane skillfully, which allowed him to catch the yellow thing.

"Ow!"

The sound of the yellow dot landing in the seat right behind him entered Tails's ears, causing the young child to turn around and exclaim the name of the hedgehog that fell into the bi-plane.

"Mary!"

Looking up at the two-tailed child, the female mammal smiled as she said, "It's good to see you too, Tails."

A smile graced the fox's face as it showed the relief he had when he saw Mary safe, but he still had a concern in his mind.

"Where's Sonic?"

Then, another bright light erupted in the the late morning sky; it was bigger and brighter than the last one, and everyone saw it.

"What was that!?" The two-tailed fox gasped in awe of the sight.

"Looks like Sonic took care of the space station." Mary looked up at Tails, who turned to her with a questioning look on his face.

"Space Station?!"

"I'll explain it later, Tails." The yellow hedgehog smiled, still looking up at the light in the sky.

Then, a beam of golden light flew from the exploding Death Egg, causing both Mary and Tails to be awe-struck.

"I'm going get closer!" The child announced, determined to investigate the beam.

"Uh, Tails..."

"What-" The young child was about to ask, but he saw what Mary saw: the light taking a U-turn and started charging towards the _Tornado_!

"OH NO!" Tails shouted in unison, while Mary maintained her calm composure.

Then, the ray of light stopped next to the plane and revealed itself as a golden, orange-eyed Sonic!

"Sonic!?" Gasped the young fox, "Is that you?"

The golden hedgehog gave his trademark smile and a nod to Tails before turning to Mary, asking, "Are you all right?"

"Better than before." Mary shouted on her reply.

Contented by the answer, Sonic vanished in a quick flash of light. Soon, the gold dot of light that was Sonic appeared on the island's center.

"Was that the anicent light that Uncle Merlin spoke of?" Tails's voice filled with awe at the sight of his friend's aura.

"Maybe so." Mary answered, unsure about the power herself, "However, this power might be something that can help the island."

"How?" Tails asked to the female hedgehog, who only answered, "I guess that we sit and watch."

The young fox did not know what to do, so he did as Mary suggested and looked at the golden light that was Sonic.

Sonic's glowing being flew to the island's highest point, which was the high hills that the trio had ventured through before meeting with Tails's uncle, Merlin. As soon as Sonic's red and white shoes touch the earth, a golden ripple-like aura started to make its way to the edges of the island.

"What's going happen to West Side Island?!" Tails shouted out his worry to Mary, still maintaining control of the _Tornado_ as he watched his home be covered in the yellow light that came from the normally blue hedgehog.

"I think it's being healed." Mary said, but she was not of her answer.

The two friends of Sonic continued to watch on as the glow engulf the whole island. With the glow's touch, each of the scarred parts of the island were transformed back to their original forms. The Oil Ocean was cleared and voided of the crud that was blending with the sea, the city of Metropolis was returned to its true form of a captial city made of trees and wood, and the residents that were robotized by Eggman were back to normal.

The fighters for freedom saw the light, and when they touched nothing happened to them. Most of them were expecting something to happen to them, and they were shocked or disappointed about it.

Seeing that his work was done, the golden Sonic returned to the sky and passed the bi-plane that Tails and Mary, who were looking at the powered up hedgehog as he flew by them.

"What is he doing now?" The young fox asked to Mary, who replied, "That's something I can't answer."

Then, the gold light despersed, and six lights, each with its own color, flew off into different directions to a corner of the world. Following that, Sonic's blue form fell from the sky and landing on the wings of his family's bi-plane.

"Sonic!" The hero's two friends shouted in joy upon seeing their good friend was not harmed.

The hedgehog's confident smile graced his young face once again as he greeted his two friends with a simple, response: "Hi, guys."


	15. Chapter 15

Adventure on West Side Island

Told by Mutitoon90

* * *

><p>Chapter Fifteen<p>

Hours following the explosion of the Death Egg and Soinc's strange and mirculous transformation, the whole of West Side Island were celebrating their regained freedom from Dr. Eggman. Those who saw the light and those who did not see the light cheered at Sonic's appearance into their captial city, praising the hedgehog as their hero.

Sonic enjoyed the praise with his friends, Mary and Tails. The hedgehogs were seen by the islanders as the heroes that their story had foretold for many ages. Tails was praised for his bravery, and even those that once bullied him apologized for their behavior towards the fox.

Many of the residents partyed until the dawn of the following day, and some even lasted until the following mid-day. By the time that the celebration ended, it was well nearing the evening.

By the second morning following the mad doctor's defeat, Sonic and Many were preparing to depart from West Side Island. This sadden most of the residents of the island, but Tails was the most depressed of all, since Sonic and Mary were his dearest friends.

"Do you guys really have to go?"

The hedgehogs looked at the two-tailed fox, who was expressing his sadness towards them.

"I'm afraid so, Tails." Mary spoke up first. Sonic added, "That's how life works sometimes."

Tails withdrew from his friends with tears in his eyes; he did not want to say good bye to the hedgehogs that saved his home land.

Sonic and Mary looked at each other, worried about their younger friend.

"What's the matter with him?" Sonic asked, hoping that Mary had a different answer or guess than the one that he had.

"My guess: it's because we're leaving."

A sigh escaped from the blue hedgehog's mouth before he spoke again.

"I wish there was some way we could calm him."

"Me too." The yellow hedgehog agreed sadly.

* * *

><p>Tails went to the hill, where he had revealed himself to Sonic for the first time, and started to replay the memories of his adventures with Mary and Sonic as tears flowed from his eyes. He did not want to bid his friends a farewell, in fear of that he would never see them again.<p>

"What's wrong, Miles?" A familiar voice grabbed the young vulpine's attention.

Turning around quickly, Tails looked and saw his uncle, Merlin, and the old fox was accompanied by two other foxes, which the youngest two-tailed fox knew as his father and mother.

"Mom? Dad? Uncle Merlin, what are they doing here?"

There was no fury in the child's voice, only innocent curiosity towards his elders, and they heard this very well as they responded to the answer.

"Miles," the female fox with a single fox spoke first, "we came here to see you and say farewell to your friends."

The statement caused a pain to grow sharper in the young fox's chest, reminding him that his friends were leaving.

"Miles, what's wrong?" The male fox with brown hair leveled his height to nearly match his son's.

Tails withdrew from his parents, but he did not get very far when his mother let behind the youngest Prowler, blocking Tails's escape.

"Answer your father." The red-haired vixen sternly commanded her son.

Considering his options, Tails finally answered his father's question.

"I don't want Sonic and Mary to go."

Hearing this, the parents and the uncle of Miles Prowler looked at each other with concern, and then they turned the attention back to the younger fox with understanding in their eyes.

"Miles, why didn't you tell us anything like this?" Merlin asked his nephew, who was answered as he started weeping.

"I didn't... know what say..."

The adults grew worried, but they maintained their composure as they continued to speak with the young fox.

"Miles," the mother announced to her child, "you know that you could talk to us at anytime."

"I know," Tails confessed to his elders, "but I couldn't bring myself to talk to you guys about anything; you three are either too busy or just not there."

The expression of guilt was evident on the faces of the three adults, who knew that Tails was being honest and truthful; Tails's father was usually busy trying to maintain Cansino Night, the mother spend most of her time working in and out of the home, and Merlin spent a strong majority of his time in the Mystic Cave.

"Miles," the father finally said after his shock from hearing his son's words, "I'd never knew."

"Neither did I." The mother gasped out with her husband.

"Same here." The wizard also confessed, more embarrassed than Tails's parents, since he was with the Oracle of the Mystic Cave.

"Besides that," Tails added to what he had said earlier, "I didn't want to bother you guys with my problems."

"That's absurd!" Tails's mother appeared to be outraged at her son's statement, "It's my job to hear your problems and advise how you deal with them!"

"Hey!" The fox with the brown hair exclaimed, "It's _not _just _your _job to hear and advise _our _son on his problems."

The wife was not happy about the husband's interference, but she stopped herself from yelling at her husband, because he was right about what he had said.

Tails was a little worried about his mother and father, but Merlin was swift to ease the two-tailed child's mind.

"Don't worry, Miles; they're just concerned with you."

"I know," Tails agreed with his uncle, "I just wish that they didn't fight."

The parents heard this and blushed, realizing that their behavior was inappropriate.

"I'm sorry, son." The father said with a fresh blush on his face, "You're important right now."

"Don't worry about it." Tails smiled weakly.

Then, Merlin and his brother spoke to Tails together.

"Miles," The uncle spoke first, "I believe you're old enough to embark on your own journeys."

"But it's your choice entirely." The father said, following his elder brother.

"What are you talking about?" The child asked, confused at his elders' words.

"What your father and uncle are trying to say is that you're free to do anything you want as long as it is for the better good." The mother answered the question.

"What do you mean?"

"What _we're_ trying to say is that if you want to go with Sonic and Mary, make sure you have their permission first."

A smile formed on Tails's face as he asked his clan, "Really!?"

The elders nodded, causing the young fox to free a shout of pure joy before he flew off to his friends.

* * *

><p>The hedgehogs were close to being ready to depart from the island, but they were still worried about their younger friend.<p>

"What can we do about Tails?" Sonic asked Mary, who responded to the question, "I don't know. Maybe we could ask him to come with us?"

"I don't know." The blue hedgehog mused at the thought, "It's not a bad idea, but how are sure that his parents would let him come with us?"

"Good question."

Then, the fox ran to the duo in his pure happiness and when he hugged them, he nearly caused them to fall down to the ground.

"Tails, what's going on?" A surprised Mary asked the fox, who was quick to answer.

"Mom and Dad and Uncle Merlin told me if I asked you two, I would be allowed to come!"

"Whoa, Tails!" The blue hedgehog exclaimed at the child, "Your parents and uncle are allowing you to come with us?"

"Yeah!"

Sonic looked at Mary, who was just as confused at the blue hedgehog was. Then, both spine-covered mammals smiled to each other; they did not have to worry about asking Tails's elders.

"That's great to hear,Tails." The yellow hedgehog's smile was sincere to the fox and herself.

"So, can I go with you and Sonic?" The two-tailed mammal looked at Mary, then to Sonic, and back to the female.

"What do you think?" The female asked the azure male.

"Hmmm..." Sonic seemingly mused at the question.

"Don't tease him." Mary sternly stated, sounding unpleased with Sonic's playfulness.

The male hedgehog laughed as he spoke to Tails.

"Yeah, you can come."

"All right!" Tails leaped into the air and started flying around the hedgehogs, being ecstatic about the news.

After talking to Tails, when he calmed down, and his elders, Mary and Sonic with their friend were more than ready to leave West Side Island. However, there were some people that wanted to say their good byes to the departing party.

"Hey, guys!"

Turning to the direction of the call, the trio saw some of their allies on the adventure.

"Hi, Mighty!" Mary shouted out, "Hi, Ray!"

"Hi, Mary." The armadillo and the flying squirrel returned the greeting.

"Hey, guys." Sonic smiled at his allies of his youth.

"Hi, Sonic." The duo greeted back before they turned to Tails, "Hey, Tails."

"Hi, guys." The fox smiled.

Then, a new vioce rang out from the local flora.

"Hey! Wait for me!"

"Hi, Ricky!" Mary smiled as she saw the ground squirrel ran towards the plane.

"Hey..." The brown rodent managed to pant out as he tried to catch his breath.

"Hi, cousin," The yellow squirrel waved a hand at Ricky.

Mighty smiled, and the others tried to cover their mouths as they laughed and giggled.

"Ricky!" The sound of Becky's voice rang out before the bear herself appeared from the greener part of the beach.

"Hi, Becky." The yellow hedgehog waved at the bear as the female ursine waved back.

"Good to see you too, Mary."

Then, the others greeted each other, but Mary knew that it might be the last time she would see most of the people that were meeting with her and Sonic before their departure.

Sonic saw the saddened face of his female ally and spoke to her about whatever was bothering her.

"What's wrong, Mary?"

Touched by the concern that the azure hedgehog was showing towards her, the yellow hedgehog responded to the question.

"It's just that I don't like saying good bye to my friends."

"Oh!"

Then, Sonic recalled when Mary had to leave for the first time, returning to her homeworld. Then, he smiled and spoke to the young teen.

"Don't worry about it. Everything will be okay."

The male hedgehog's words were a comfort to the ex-human, and they did ease some of the pain of leaving the island. However, Mary still did not want to say good bye.

"Mary! Sonic!"

The hedgehogs looked and saw Tails as the two-tailed fox asked them a question.

"Are we ready to go?"

"As soon as we've said bye to everyone." The cobalt hedgehog answered quickly.

Hearing this, the young vulpine ran off and encountered his elders, who were just arrived at the beach.

"So," Merlin was the first to speak, "What did they say?"

With a great smile, the youngest of the Prolwer clan gave his answer.

"They said I could come with them!"

"That's wonderful." The mother replied in a bittersweet tone of voice.

The vixen's husband understood his wife's sadness; it was his only child that was leaving as well as his wife's, and he did not want to see him leave just as much.

"Don't worry about me too much, Mom." Tails said, apparently sensing his mother's sadness, "I'll be okay."

It eased his mother's worrys to an extent, but Tails knew it would take more than his words to comfort her.

"I promise that I'll write to you every chance I can get."

That cause more comfort to the mother.

Then, the two-tailed child's father spoke up.

"It's good to hear that, Miles. I just hope that you and your friends take good care of each other."

"I promise!"

"May your adventures be filled with hope and promise for the future." Merlin wisely blessed his nephew, who was starting to cry a little.

"Thanks, Uncle Merlin." Tails said to his elder before he hugged the old wizard. Then, he hugged each of his parents and said, "Thanks for everything."

In the midst of the bittersweet moment, Tails managed to pull from his family and ran to the _Tornado_, where Sonic and Mary were waiting for him.

"Ready to go?" Sonic asked the fox, who answered the hedgehog, "I am."

"Let's go!" The blue hedgehog shouted out to the members of his team that were also his friends.

The trio climbed into the plane; Tails climbed into the pilot's seat, Mary sat in the passenager's seat and Sonic took a spot on the wings on the plane.

"Ready to go!" Tails called out, which Sonic responded to by saying, "Then, get it started."

Then, the two-tailed fox, remembering what Ray the flying squirrel had taught him, started up the engine. The propeller spun around, causing the airplane to move forward. Tails knew well enough to turn the plane from the forest that was linked to the shore.

As the plane started to take off, Mary, Tails and Sonic saw that some of the people on the island were running next to the plane, putting in their final good byes to the departing heroes.

"Good bye, everyone!" Mary shouted over the roars of the engine of the _Tornado_.

"See ya later!" Cried out some of the runners as they started to become slower than the bi-plane.

Ray, the yellow flying squirrel, flew nearby the plane and gave small salute to the trio before returning to Mighty's side.

"Bye!" Tails shouted out.

Sonic, seeing the 'good bye' party, smiled and gave a wave to them, before the _Tornado_ became airborne.

As the plane flew from the island that they call home, the group that was composed of Ricky, Becky, the Prolwer clan, Mighty and Ray saw a cyan light beaming from the airplane.

"Look at that!" Mighty shouted out, while Ray added, "That girl's a show-off."

"Yeah," Becky agreed before adding, "but she's not as bad as Sonic."

"Yeah." Ricky laughed out his agreement with a nodded.

In the _Tornado_, Mary was holding the cyan Chaos Emerald as the jewel made it shine with power for a few moments before returning it to her backpack. Then, the yellow hedgehog turned to her friends and asked as loud as she could a question.

"Where are we going this time?"

"You'll find out soon enough!" Sonic yelled back with a cryptic smile on his face.

Mary did not like the answer, but she asked Tails, hoping for a different answer.

"Tails, do you know where we are going?"

"Nope, just following Sonic's directions."

With a loud sigh, Mary sat back and reached for her backpack. In search of an item, the female hedgehog pulled out a simple notebook that had a pencil in the rings. Pulling out the pencil and opening the notebook, Mary started writing down her most recent adventure with her friend, Sonic as she did the day that she brought the notebook and pencil. She was hopful that she would have enough time before she and her allies reached their destination so she could be done writing about her adventure on West Side Island.


End file.
